The Greatest Zootopian Hero
by Old Goat
Summary: Believe it or not con artist Nick Wilde is walking on air when he's given a super suit. Can he, along with a hard drinking and cynical cop named Judy Hopps, save the city from itself? He may not be the hero the city wants, but he's the hero they're going to get! This story is based on the 1980's TV show The Greatest American Hero and is a parody of that show, not a crossover.
1. Dark Days In Zootopia

**The Greatest Zootopian Hero**

 **Believe it or not con artist Nick Wilde is walking on air when he's given a super suit. Can he, along with a hard drinking and cynical cop named Judy Hopps, save the city from itself? He may not be the hero the city wants, but he's the hero they're going to get! This story is based on the 1980's TV show The Greatest American Hero and is a parody of that show, not a crossover.  
**

* * *

 **We continue with the next story in the** **I Love the 80's Flashback Fridays Series** **with a Zootopian take on Stephen Cannell's** _ **The Greatest American Hero.**_ **This comedy based drama took a mild manner teacher played by William Katt and made him the recipient of a special suit that granted him superhuman powers. Unfortunately he lost the instructions! Partnered with a hard-fisted FBI agent played by Robert Culp, he fumbled his way from one adventure to the next for three seasons from 1981 -1983.**

 **We begin our story during the city of** **Zootopia's darkest days. Society is slowly slipping into chaos, because for some unknown reason predators are reverting back to their savage ways. Mayor Lionheart is facing impeachment by the city council for his inability to stop the problem and for being a predator. Assistant Mayor Bellwether and her associates are now running the city with an iron hoof. (Okay, the beginning is a little bit sinister…)**

 _I do not own the rights to Zooptopia or The Greatest American Hero or any of its characters. This story was written solely for the reader's enjoyment and without any profitable purposes. The story, all names, characters, and incidents portrayed in this story are fictitious._

* * *

 **Chapter 1: Dark Days In Zootopia**

Nick Wilde watched his ancient television as it showed flickering images of the latest government roundup of protesters in Savannah Central, several of them were predators and he winced as the camera showed a brutal muzzling of a young wolf cub who couldn't have been over twelve. Peter Moosebridge came back on and continued to drone about another bear going feral over in the Haymarket district. Sighing, the scruffy looking red fox in his boxer shorts yawned as he poured himself a bowl of salmon flavored kibble and added hot water so it could make the so called gravy which made the chunks somewhat edible. "I sure miss Fabienne Growley, she may have been a cat but she was cute," he sighed to himself as he dug his spoon into the bowl. The snow leopard was a veteran anchor of ZNN, but she was retired as the public's growing mistrust of predators grew and the city's government began censoring all news.

With the morning news coming to an end and the channel's first talk show beginning, the fox turned off the television. The red fox really didn't want to watch that old goat Bill O'Baaly whine and carry on about the growing predator conspiracy. Nick sighed as he looked around at the small dank basement room he rented, it was cold and damp. What passed for a bed was an old dresser drawer with a cheap small mattress he had salvaged from a dumpster, but at least this place was better than sleeping under a bridge or in Finn's old van. Money was tight, because it had grown almost impossible for the fox to pull any kind of scam, get rich scheme, or even find honest work.

Being an omnivore, he now subsided on cheap kibble, Ramon noodles, and whatever few vegetables he could afford. Things were worse for many of the other predators, such as the felines who had to have what was now expensive protein to survive. The staples of their diet, such as fowl or fish, were getting harder to legally obtain. He and Finn had managed to do some periodic trout poaching from the river, but a crackdown by the cops had made even that risky. The latest move by the city was a suddenly suspicious health concern about grubs, crickets, and other common insects which were popular in a processed form and now even that food source becoming difficult to obtain. Last night he and Finn, had dined on worms dug up from the park, with a marinara sauce that the raccoon who prepared it called ketchup spaghetti. The former award winning chef had managed to make the dish edible, although the sauce still had a strong ketchup taste.

Washing himself in the sink, he dug around for a clean shirt and pair of pants. He found his favorite green tropical Pawaiian print shirt and pulled it on, along with a rumpled pair of khakis. Finding a mismatched tie, he put that on and after combing his fur, he felt ready to face the world again. As he opened the basement door, he heard the voice of his landlady. Mable was a wildebeest in her late seventies and was sitting in her favorite chair by the window. "Nicky, please come here!" she called out.

Nick's ears drooped and his tail dragged along the carpet as the entered the room. The elderly bovine looked up from her knitting, pulled back her long grey fur and frowned at him. "If it's about the rent, I know I'm behind…" he began.

"Nicky, I know you will pay me when you get the money," she sighed as she reached for her glasses. "I just wanted to say good morning, I haven't seen you around much this past week and please don't worry about the rent! I have better paying tenants who live upstairs and my pension. After all those years I worked with your mother, rest her soul, do you really think I'm going to throw her only pup out onto the streets."

"No ma'am," Nick meekly replied. He hated taking anything from the elderly widow, but he did try to pay her when he had some money and also did odd jobs around the building to justify her obvious charity.

"Now that all of that is settled," the widow sighed. "I know that you are doing your best looking for employment, but please be careful out there today. They are starting Mayor Lionheart's impeachment hearing and everyone is very tense, this town is like a powder keg ready to explode. I still don't know what that poor lion has done for them to justify his removal, it all seems…fishy to me. Speaking of which, when you get home I have a little gift for you in the kitchen."

"Oh?" Nick asked.

"Some processed fish sticks. Larry down at the grocery store said the health department was claiming that they were contaminated, but he knew they were perfectly good and so he gave his last box to me to give to you," she answered. "Something is going on in this city and I don't like it. Larry said that the health department also told him he had to stop letting predators use his bathrooms, hygienic concerns they told him. He needed to have prey only facilities and separate facilities for predators, separate but equal!"

Nick didn't really know what to say, he was used to being looked down at and ridiculed for being a fox and for him this was just an ongoing fact of his life. "Thank you for thinking about me," he replied with a smile as he walked over and kissed his landlady's cheek.

She reached up with her hoof and patted his arm. "You're such a nice boy Nicky, I'm sure you'll find a job today."

He left the apartment building and looked back over his shoulder at the building. Like its owner it was aging and was more of a tenement then a luxury apartment as the sign advertised, but all the real apartments would never think about renting to a fox or just about any other predator.

"Yo fox!" a voice called out from a nearby alleyway. Nick looked into the shadows and saw a wiry brown furred weasel wearing a dirty white sleeveless undershirt shirt and black shorts with red-and-white stripes.

"Well if it isn't Whestlton," the fox replied with a smirk as he crossed the road.

"It's Weaselton! Duke Weaselton!" the weasel angrily snapped back.

"Run out of bootleg movies to pawn off on the poor innocent public?" Nick chuckled as he leaned against the alleyway wall.

"Aren't you high and mighty Wilde," Weaselton answered. "If I recall, you aren't above a little petty theft yourself fox."

"You're boring me Duke," Nick sighed. "I've got more important things to do then stand here yapping with you."

"Don't give me that, I know the cops shut down your little pawsicle scheme," the weasel scoffed with an evil grin. "That little spot you and your little furball friend had was too close to the Lemming Brothers Bank, they don't want your kind around there no more."

"I've got other ideas," the fox replied. Nick was somewhat taken aback from the fact that the weasel was aware that his and Finn's little scheme had been abruptly closed one afternoon by a couple large cops. They had set up their cart like they always do near the bank, just before closing time and were ready for the little employees to begin filing out. Suddenly two cops showed up in front of him commanding him to close and leave the area. He tried to show him that he had all the permits required to conduct his business, but the uniformed rams didn't care and shoved over his cart. The icy treats were spilled onto the sidewalk and a day's work was ruined in a matter of minutes. As he was cleaning up the mess, he received a verbal warning that _his kind_ wasn't wanted around there anymore. The next day when he passed by the area, he saw that Jerry Jumbeaux had set up a stand in that exact spot. The elephant had hired a groundhog to staff the stand, which sold frozen treats that looked remarkably like pawsicles.

"I've got a sure score," the weasel said as he leaned forward. "All I need is your little pal to drive us over the Canyonlands and pick up some flower bulbs tonight, that's all. It pays a couple hundred for pickup and delivery, not a bad score. "

"Do we have to rob someone," the fox scoffed. "You're the Duke of Bootleg and sometimes into petty thievery, but burglary?"

"Naw, we don't have to do anything but make a pickup and delivery," the weasel replied as he leaned forward. Reaching into his pocket he pulled out a toothpick and shoved it between his teeth as he grinned up at Nick. "Easy peasy Wilde."

The fox leaned back against the wall again and sighed, "Nothing is easy these days."

* * *

Judy Laverne Hopps had come to Zootopia as a wide-eyed and naive rookie, a product of Mayor Lionheart's Mammal Inclusion Initiative. The rabbit's reception at the First Precinct was less than enthusiastic by the other officers and by Chief Adrian Bogo, who felt she had been assigned to his command almost as a form of punishment. At first she objected to the endless parking duty assignments she was given every day, but finally she just surrendered to her fate and with a great lack of enthusiasm did her dreary job day after day.

She found solace in drink, it started with carrot juice martinis and soon she was drinking whiskey every night after work. Helplessly she watched as the number of predators that went savage grew every day and as the political pressure forced Chief Bogo to gradually decrease the number of experienced predator police officers on the force, replacing with hastily trained rookies. The loss of effective police on the streets led to an increase of crime, including those against carnivores.

Sitting in a dingy bar, the rabbit watched the news, a simple car accident had escalated out of control and the ocelot behind the wheel was beaten to death in the city streets in broad daylight. No one was arrested as events spiraled into a riot as looters robbed predator owned businesses on the city's east side. With a sigh she began to order another drink, but then her cell phone rang.

"Wolford you old mutt, I thought you moved out west?" she answered the caller with a smile. Of all the animals at the station, only the timber wolf and a fat cheetah named Benjamin Clawhauser had been friendly to her. Now Wolford was gone, kicked out by an internal affairs report that claimed that the whole K-9 unit was too dangerous and Benny had been sent to the basement to the Record Archives. "So what has my favorite fleabag been up to?"

* * *

 **Author's Notes:**

 **This is the second story in the** **I Love the 80's Flashback Fridays Series** **\- A Zootopian remake of some classic 1980 movies and TV shows.**

 **Tail's from the Darkside –** There was a campy horror TV series during the 1980's called Tales from the Darkside and this is my homage to that series. Judy finds out there is a reason why some old cemeteries have wrought iron fences and why this particular cemetery has its gates welded shut. Nick drags our little skeptic on a ghost tour led by the strange and enigmatic Undertaker. Can his seven tales of the supernatural convince the bunny that there are some mysteries that even she just can't solve? (Completed – Rated T)


	2. Those Aren't Moldy Onions Fox!

**Chapter 2: Those Aren't Moldy Onions Fox!**

 _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ **never broke the top 30, but was still very popular. It originally aired opposite to NBC's top 15 show,** _ **Real People**_ **, but does anybody really remember** _ **Real People**_ **? Let's see a show of hands if you watched that show…put your hand down** **Mr. Fred Willard, you were a co-host!** **Then it was moved to Friday nights, opposite** _ **Dallas**_ **(1982's #2 show) and no Nick didn't shoot JR! The show's last season was on Thursday nights, opposite of** _ **Magnum P.I.**_

 **So get your big bowl of Lay's Potato Chips, because as their 1981 Ad said** _ **"Betcha can't eat just one"**_ **and sit back for tonight's chapter of** **The Greatest Zootopian Hero**.

* * *

"So what has my favorite wolf been up to?" Judy Hopps asked former police officer Alan Wolford over the phone.

"Look Judy, I've come across something, something big in the Medowlands and I need to get it to the department," he hastily answered. "I need you to help me."

"Alan you know I'm just a meter maid, Bogo won't let me anywhere near real police work," she sighed. "I don't know what I can do for you?"

"Listen Judy, you're one of the few honest cops left in the department who is smart enough to understand what is going to happen," he growled. "I just need you to take the evidence I have and get it to Bogo, don't trust anyone but Chief Bogo!"

"I'll see what I can do," the rabbit replied.

"Meet me at ten tonight on Route 66 in the Canyonlands and come armed, we've got some smugglers to catch," he said in an urgent voice. "We must stop that shipment from getting to them!"

"Who's them?" she asked, but the wolf had hung up.

"So Jude the Dude, you want another shot?" the bartender asked.

"Naw Phil," bring me coffee and plenty of it," she said in a worried voice to the zebra behind the counter. "I think I've gotta steal a cop car."

* * *

"Are you crazy Nick!" the small tan colored fennec fox in the bowling shirt and shorts yelled at the larger fox. "How do you even know that Duke is on the up and up?"

"Look Finn, I'm starving and you're starving, we can't pull anymore scams because of the cops. We can't even find honest jobs, we have to do something!" the red fox argued.

"But Nick where we going to get the money for the gas?" Finn asked. "I'm flat broke, do you have any cash?"

"I've got some and Duke said he'd kick in the rest, at least enough to get the gas to get there and back," the red fox sighed.

"But what is this don't pan out?" the smaller fox growled. "What then fox!"

"Then we end up doing what we have to do to survive," Nick replied in a determined voice. "If that means taking from others, then we will."

The weasel arrived on time and he as he climbed into the van, he sniffed and then began fake hacking. "This place sticks!" he grumbled. "Smells like fox musk and dirty socks, you ever clean this rust bucket Finn?"

"If you don't like my van, then walk slimeball!" the fennec fox growled.

Tossing an empty Styrofoam coffee cup out of the window Duke laughed, "You live here in this mess?"

There was a low menacing growl as the little fox dug for his baseball bat, Nick reached over and took it from his paws. "Come on guys, we need to get moving if we're going to make it on time," the fox sighed. "Wastlington, do you have the address?"

"It's Weaselton fox!" the thin mammal yelled. "Yeah I got the address?"

Nick took the slip of paper and peered at the directions. "I think this is near Sandy Ridge, just beyond the Canyonlands," he told the little fox who had climbed into the driver's seat.

"Don't you guys have a GPS on your phones," Duke asked.

"Who can afford a phone anymore?" Finn scoffed. "I don't see you with one either."

The weasel sighed, "So what do we do now?"

"It's called a map," Nick laughed as he picked up a city map from the junk that was lying around inside the van. "So we take Route 66 up through the Canyonlands to Peters Street and from there just start looking for addresses."

"Somehow I have a bad feeling about this," the little fox sighed as he started the van. It backfired a few times, but finally began rolling down the road.

"Hey Finn, what happened to your van's mural?" Nick asked. "It looks like someone took white spray paint over it?"

Finn had taken great pride in the van's mural showing a heroic looking timber wolf barbarian holding a fainting white vixen in his arms.

"I did," Finn growled. "The cops kept harassing me about it. I was told that it's too provocative and was drawing too much attention from the fuzz."

"Too bad," the red fox grumbled. "I liked it."

After they filled the gas tank almost half full, the little fox drove them to the highway and within a few hours they arrived at Peters Street, there was just one business and it was huge nursery supply warehouse. Turning off the lights, Finn drove down to the loading dock where they saw a couple of surly looking rams. "Back it up here," one of the guys yelled and Finn reversed his van to the dock.

Duke slipped out of the van and approached the two rams. "This is the best you could find Wellington?" one of them asked.

"It's Weaselton, why does everyone have a problem with my name?" he huffed. "Let's just load the goods and we will be on our way. I was told we'd get paid half now and the remainder when we make delivery."

"You were told wrong moron," the ram laughed. "Who would trust a weasel and two foxes? No payments until these crates are delivered to the Meadowlands."

Nick dug his paw into a crate and pulled out some flower bulbs. "All this for some moldy old onions?" he asked.

"Get you paws out of there and just do what we tell you!" a ram shouted. "Now get the hell out of here before someone sees you with them!"

"Are they stolen?" Nick asked.

"You're asking too many questions fox!" the ram menacingly said as he stepped closer to Nick.

"It's okay, we're on our way!" Duke said as he began to push Nick back to the van. "Get in the car Wilde before you blow this!"

"You've got to be kidding!" Finn said. "We're smuggling flower bulbs in the middle of the night, what's up with that Duke."

"I have no idea furball," the weasel replied. "Let's just get these crates to this address in the Meadowlands and get paid.

"I still don't like this!" Finn replied as he looked up with concern at Nick. "Something isn't right."

"Just drive Finn," the red fox sighed. "Let's get out of here before the cops show up." Nick watched the two rams get into a black sedan and quickly drive the other direction. He looked back at the weasel who now looked scared.

They were about a mile away and had just turned onto Route 66 when they saw the explosion behind them and the flames pouring out of the building they had just left.

Finn stopped the van as they looked back in surprise at the raging inferno. "What just happened?" the little fox asked.

"Just keep driving Finn and stay within the speed limit," Nick to his friend as he craned his neck to see what was happening. "Drive nice and steady, don't draw any attention."

The little fox just shook his head in agreement, behind him the weasel whimpered.

They were about two miles away, when they saw sirens in front of them, but the patrol cars zoomed right by their van and towards the fire. Soon they left the built up areas and entered into the dark desert of the Canyonlands.

"Dudes, that was too close," Finn muttered. "What the heck do you got us involved with?"

"I was told that it was just a pick up and delivery job!" the weasel whimpered. "They didn't say anything about arson."

"Is there something hidden in those crates besides blubs?" Nick asked as he slipped out of the passenger's seat and crawled back towards the boxes in the rear of the van.

"If you get us killed Duke, I'll BITE YOUR FACE OFF!" the little fox growled.

Suddenly there were red and blue lights approaching from behind as a police cruiser was roaring towards them. Then the van began jerking as it began to lose power. "We're so busted guys!" the red fox whined.


	3. The Bunny's Bad to the Bone!

**Chapter 3: The Bunny's Bad to the Bone!**

 **Our Flashback Fridays continues with another chapter of** _ **The Greatest Zootopian Hero**_ **! Tonight we learn what had happened to our bunny to make her into a depressed, no nonsense, and heavily drinking cynic.**

 **Joey Scarbruy sang the theme song for the show, "Believe It or Not". The song was written by Mike Post and Stephen Geyer and peaked at number two on Billboard's Hot 100. It was actually sung by Glen Campbell a year later and released in limited quantities on a 45 rpm phonograph record**. **(For you youngins, a 45 is small vinyl record with only two songs on it, one on side 1 and another on side 2.)**

 **So tear open and bite into your Whatchamacallit, you know that candy bar with the weird hypnotic pop-art 80's commercial that made you think you were on drugs,** **and sit back for tonight's chapter of _The Greatest Zootopian Hero_** **.**

* * *

Judy Hopps entered into the police station and furtively looked around, before going to the locker room and opening her locker. The grey rabbit frowned at the meter maid uniforms as she shoved them aside to find the uniform she was looking for in the back. Reaching into the box, she pulled out and put on her dark blue pants with the metal kneepads and light blue neoprene uniform shirt. Then she strapped on the dark blue Kevlar stab vest before sitting down and putting on the black coverings around her wrists and ankles. Finally she buckled on her black utility belt. She had been issued only one weapon which was still in its original box, taking it out she held up the tranquilizer dart gun and admired it before holstering it and grabbing five darts. He only other weapon was a can of Acme Fox-off mace that her father had given her when she left home.

Dressed in her uniform, she pinned on her badge as she walked out into the empty hallway and made her way toward the car pool. She looked over at the three wheeled meter scooter and shook her head because she would need something more powerful than that for tonight's mission. Her eyes caught the sight of new Z-240 Raptor and its somewhat boxy vehicle shape. It was painted black, with a white zigzag on the side and a white top with red and blue lights. That was the police cruiser she needed for tonight, she mused but she knew that the carpool supervisor wouldn't let her take the vehicle so she had to figure out a creative way to get the keys.

"Hey Judy," she heard a voice call her from the hallway. She turned and saw the portly cheetah closing the stairwell door behind him. His reassignment to the Record Archive room meant that he was in the basement, next to the furnace and there was not a still operational elevator that reached down that far. The department had been undergoing drastic financial cutbacks in its maintenance budget as resources were being transferred to hire new replacements for the experienced predator officers that had been forced out. Even officer Rhinowitz, who was not the brightest mammal in uniform, expressed his concern with the inexperienced new officer's performance.

"Did you hear about Fangmeyer?" Benjamin Clawhauser asked her. "Internal Affairs got him suspended! They claim that he bared his teeth at someone and Bogo went to bat for him, but it was a no go."

"Did he bare his teeth?" Judy asked. "That big tiger was always so careful about being very professional."

"The video shows him yawning and he wasn't even that close the ewe that filed the complaint," the fat cat shrugged. "You're all dressed out, has Bogo decided to now put you in the field?"

"Well…" Judy began to reply.

Suddenly down the hallway there was a pitiful whine and both the officers turned to see two patrol officers dragging a muzzled coyote down the hallway towards an interrogation room. There was a trail of blood smeared on the tile.

"Hey you two rookies!" Judy yelled as she turned to stop the two rams, but Clawhauser grabbed her arm and held her back.

"That's the way things are working around here now Judy," he whimpered. "Don't get involved."

"But that mammal has his civil rights!" the rabbit snapped. "They have no legal authority to treat him that way! It's a violation of the department's policies and they need to be stopped."

"You can't help him," the frightened cheetah replied. "Those black bands on their arms mean that they are part of the new city task force and they answer only to the assistant mayor."

The rabbit looked up at the bigger cat and then down the hallway at the trail of blood leading into the room. "This has to end Benny," she sighed. "I need your help, Wolford called me and he has something important that needs to get to the Chief. I'm supposed to meet him tonight and I need to get a real police car."

The cheetah looked down at her. "I don't know?" he stammered. "I might get in trouble."

"What is it that Gazelle said before they had her arrested?" Judy asked the big cat.

"Good mammals must take a stand when evil arises," Ben replied as he fearfully looked at the bloodstains. "Wwwhat do do you want me to do?"

"I just need you to keep the motor pool supervisor busy while I borrow a car," the rabbit replied. "Priscilla likes your jokes, just keep her entertained."

"I'll do it for Gazelle!" the fat cat announced to her with renewed determination.

They walked down the motor pool office and the motor pool supervisor was in the supply locker doing inventory. Judy moved into the shadows and motioned to the fat Cheetah for him to go into the locker room and talk to the pig.

"Good evening Priscilla!" he called to her with a cheery voice. "Working late tonight?"

"Hello Benny, just doing a quick inventory," she replied. "You're working the late shift again?"

"Yeah, Bogo wants me working at nights now," he sighed as he walked into the supply locker. "They say I make some of the other officer's nervous."

"You make someone nervous Benny?" she laughed. "You're the sweetest cat I know! So, what can I do for you tonight?"

"I've got a new joke," the cheetah replied. "What do you call a three humped camel?" He leaned back on the door and it closed with a click.

"No Benny...grab the door!" the pig squealed. "I don't have a key on me."

"Sorry," the cheetah meekly replied as he pulled on the locked door. "Can you call someone to get us out?"

"No, my radio and cell phone are on the table in the next room," the pig sighed. "Do you have yours?"

"I guess they're afraid we might take pictures of the files, so they don't let us have our cell phones on us while we work and they never gave me a radio," Ben replied as he watched Judy silently slipped into the office. "I'm sorry, maybe someone will come in soon and let us out?"

"I hope so," Priscilla sighed. "So cutie, what do you call a three humped camel?"

"Pregnant!" the cheetah laughed.

The pig also laughed so hard that she snorted.

Judy picked up the keys to the car before she slipped back out of the office and down the hallway, her ears twitched when she heard that Ben was launching into a new set of jokes much to the amusement of Priscilla.

 _That joke was terrible,_ Judy thought to herself as she shook her head. She looked around the parking lot and when she was sure that she was alone, she climbed into the large cruiser and after many adjustments to the seat to match her small frame, she started the vehicle. She slowly pulled out onto the city street and once clear of the station, the cruiser roared down the street toward her destination in the Canyonlands.

 _This better be good Wolfie, because if it isn't I just ended my career for nothing, s_ he pondered. As she drove down the street she realized how different the city was a night then during the days. The roads and walkways were mostly vacant because of the city wide curfew. She passed several other police cruisers parked at intersections, but no one made any attempts to stop her as she turned on the Route 66 and towards the Canyonlands.

Dialing her phone, she attempted to reach Wolford but he didn't answer and his phone just gave a weird squealing noise. "Damn it Wolfie, pick up!" she cursed to herself as she weaved in and out of traffic. "Answer wolf!" Several miles past Hyenahurst, she heard reports of a fire at an old nursery located off of Peters Street and that they were to keep any eye out for an older model white van.

Ten miles into the desert, the traffic thinned out and the road became darker as most businesses and homes were left behind, it was just empty and void of habitation. She growled as she tried the phone again, but still no answer. A white van passed her heading the other direction and she hesitated for a few minutes. _If Wolford has dumped me, maybe catching those arsonists might at least keep me from losing my job,"_ she mused. The she pulled the cruiser off the road and across the median before snapping on the siren and lights as she pursued the fleeing van. "Gods, I could use a drink about now," she sighed. She was tempted to reach for the flask on the seat beside her, but knowing that she had to have all her wits about her she instead drew and charged up the oversized taser rifle from the car's built in holster.

She reached for the radio to call for backup and then something unexpected happened, everything just stopped! The patrol car sputtered with its lights flashing on and off before going dead. The car just rolled to a stop with the van doing the same thing in front of her. She grabbed the taser rifle and pushed open the car's door as she stepped out. "Police! Everyone out of the car with your paws on your heads," she yelled as she approached the silent van. The passenger van door pushed open and a thin red fox climbed down with his paws raised above his head.

 _A fox, why did it have to be a fox?_ she thought as her mind raced back to when she was a child and she confronted another red fox at the county fair. Gideon Gray had stolen her friend's tickets and she was determined to get the back by confronting the larger predator, but words turned into violence as he shoved her to the ground and clawed her face. Laughing at her and her hopes of becoming a cop, he turned away and didn't see the rock she had picked up. The blow busted his lower jaw and knocked him senseless, it was on that day that everyone learned that no one messes with Judy Laverne Hopps.

The fox turned towards her and gave her what appeared to be a smirk before smoothly saying, "Good evening officer, I can explain everything."

"Sure you can Slick," she growled.

* * *

 **Next week...there be aliens!**


	4. There Be Aliens!

**Chapter 4: There Be Aliens!**

 **Another Friday night and time for our next chapter of the Greatest Zootopian Hero!**

 **Perhaps this chapter should be called "There Be Lawyers!" Warner Brothers, the owners of DC Comics were not at all pleased with the television show the Greatest American Hero and they claimed that it was an infringement of their character Superman, so they went to court. District Judge Constance Baker Motley found that Superman and The Greatest American Hero were not substantially similar, and that even if they were, the latter was a parody of Superman and therefore protected under the fair use doctrine.**

 **1981 was also a landmark year for the music industry when a fledgling cable channel called MTV was launched at noon on Saturday, August 1** **st** **. Of course the first video shown was** _ **"**_ _ **Video Killed the Radio Star**_ _ **"**_ **by the The Buggles. So dust off your boom box and listen to** _ **"Money For Nothing"**_ **by** **Dire Straits as you read tonight's chapter, after all "I want my MTV."**

* * *

The stony rocks of the desert that surrounded them appeared pale grey in the evening's moonlight and around them stately cacti and squat mesquite bushes dotted the landscape, bearing silent witness to the confrontation. The heat of the day was quickly dissipating into the night's chill, despite the distant furnaces of the Great Wall which was hidden just beyond the canyon ridges. Multicolored stone formations towered overhead, all of which predated the sprawling city and its mammal made wonders. This was old land, the lands which once belonged to the coyotes and peccary whose tribes had been driven out by the settlers over a century ago.

"I said everyone out of the van!" Officer Judy Hopps commanded. She shouldered the massive taser rifle and was aiming at the lone red fox standing by the van but he wasn't paying her any attention, instead he was staring with his mouth open at the night sky. She looked up at what he was watching and just about dropped the gun in her astonishment. Just above the nearest ridge, a large ball of light was hovering and pulsing in the night sky. Suddenly it exploded into three smaller colored spheres which shot overhead and began bathing the awed onlookers in red lights and then just as sudden, the three balls shot into the night sky and disappeared.

"What was…?" Judy began to ask. But then seemingly out of nowhere, a large saucer shaped craft appeared silently floating over the road before them.

"Is that a flying saucer?" the fox stammered as he walked towards the police officer. The rabbit didn't answer, but her ears shot up straight as a panel opened in the side of the glowing object and a black tube that almost looked like an oversized vacuum cleaner hose slid out and snaked its way towards the van. As the tube slithered its way towards them, Judy heard a click as whoever was left inside the van locked the door and left their companion outside. She lowered the gun towards the tube, ignoring the fox who had stumbled next to her. There was a popping noise as if something was stuck inside the tube before them and then with a burping sound, a disheveled looking timber wolf was spat out and onto the ground.

"Wolford!" Judy cried out as the wolf staggered to his feet and began dusting off his clothes. "What the hell is going on?"

Suddenly there was another swishing sound and a suitcase sized black box was propelled out of the tube and into the wolf's back sending him sprawling onto the ground with a grunt. He stood, turned at the spaceship, shook his fist and growled, "That wasn't nice, I told you I was sorry!"

The fox was right beside her now, almost cowering next to her as she faced the timber wolf that had picked up the box and turned back towards her. "She wanted me to give this to the fox," he said.

"Who's she and why me?" the fox whimpered.

"The alien," the wolf shrugged. "She said to give you this box, there's a special suit inside that will give you super powers. You are Nick Wilde?" The fox nodded as the wolf gave him the box.

"Wolford what exactly is going on?" Judy asked as she lowered the gun. "What's this about a super suit?"

"Nick needs to save the city because the suit will only work for him," the wolf replied. "You've got to help him Judy, the key is in the bulbs."

"I don't understand?" Judy began to ask, but the wolf had run over to the van and after tugging on the door, he grasped the side mirror and clung to it. "You've got to save me from her!" he wailed.

"You must return now darling!" a metallic female voice called out from the craft. The black tube rose and slithered over towards the wolf.

"I don't want to go!" he howled.

"Where are you taking him?" Judy demanded as she shouldered the gun. "Halt in the name of the law!" She pulled the gun's trigger and nothing happened. Then realizing it was as dead as all the other electronic devices, she threw it onto the ground and drew her dart gun.

"I don't think that's going to work," the fox named Nick whimpered.

"But you said you loved me!" the strange metallic voice called out to the wolf. "I told my parents we would would be home in time for dinner."

"No!" the wolf protested. "That was before I knew you were a shapeshifting alien."

"That didn't stop you last night!" the metallic voice sternly replied. "Let's go darling."

There was a noise from the tube and just like a vacuum cleaner, it began sucking everything into the tube. The wolf's hindpaws were pulled off the ground, but he held tight to the van's mirror. Suddenly there was a tearing noise as the wolf's pants and then his boxer shorts were sucked off his body, leaving him naked but still clinging to the mirror.

"Judy you have to save the city!" Wolford wailed before the mirror snapped off and he was pulled into the tube.

The space craft began to shimmer and rose into the night sky, but then it suddenly stopped. A panel opened in the ship's side and bathed from behind by the craft's interior lights was the body of a curvy she wolf in metallic silver clothing. She threw something at them and it landed at the rabbit's feet with a clunk. "Sorry about that!" the thing that looked like a wolf yelled as she closed the door and the saucer shot into the night sky, soaring straight out of sight. Judy looked down at her feet and laying there was the broken mirror.

"That was intense," the fox standing next to him said. "Was it me or did that wolf really have four arms?" Then the lights of the police vehicle came back on and the van roared to life as it squealed down the road and away from the stunned fox and the rabbit.

"Finn wait!" the fox yelled as he ran shaking his fists at the departing van. "Wait for me!"

"Freeze!" the rabbit behind him commanded. "You're not going anywhere fox until I figure what is going on."

Nick turned and faced the police offer who was pointing her dart gun at him. Her ears were erect and she was bathed in the flashing blue and red lights behind her. "Aw come on!" he groaned.

"Pick up the box," she growled.

"I'm not touching that thing," he replied. "I just want to go home and back to bed, this has to be some kind of bad dream."

"I SAID PICK IT UP!" she yelled.

"NO!" he yelled back.

"Have it your way," Judy sighed.

Nick turned to run and heard a popping sound, there was a stinging sensation just to the left of his tail and everything began to go black as he fell. "Youzzz shottt mee in da butttt!" he mumbled as everything seemed to go darker than it already was.

"Sweet cheese and crackers!" he heard the rabbit cop curse before the darkness claimed him. "How am I going to explain this to Bogo?"


	5. The Super Suit

**Chapter 5: The Super Suit**

 **Flashback Friday Returns with another exciting chapter of _The Greatest Zootopian Hero_. Tonight Nick tries out the suit the hard way. **

**The part of Bill Maxwell was played by the brilliant actor Robert Culp, who famously starred with Bill Cosby the in the 1960's _I Spy_ television show. Agent Maxwell was a thirty year FBI veteran with a mediocre career and a tendency to be somewhat overbearing, he was the guy who saw a commie behind every bush and felt the country was going downhill because of hippies. His character was a conservative contrast to his more liberal idealistic school teacher partner Ralph Hinkely. After the show's end, Robert Culp continued his career in the movies and television, including playing the character of Grandpa in that classic holiday tale, _Santa's Slay._ He passed away in 2010 after over 50 years in the entertainment business. **

**So dig through that old box in the attic and find your pair of parachute pants…wait they don't fit anymore? Oh well, here's tonight's chapter…**

* * *

Nick awoke sprawled out on a small bed which was covered with stuffed toy bunnies and smelled like rabbit and booze. The fox looked around the tiny apartment, which didn't take long. The room barely had space for the bed, a chest of drawers and a table with a small microwave. The ceiling was water stained and the wallpaper was peeling. "I guess this isn't the Ritz?" he mumbled to himself as he sat up.

The door flew open as the gruff uniformed rabbit walked in and handed him a glass of water. "Here Slick, drink this!"

"Thanks, he mumbled. "I'd ask you how I got up here, but my head tells me how."

"Sorry about that!" Judy laughed. "You're heavy and so I had to drag you up the stairs."

"Kitnapping is now a normal thing for the cops these days?" he asked, then with a smirk he quickly added, "Or did you just want a fox in your bed?"

"Yeah, dream on Chompers," she sarcastically laughed back. "Now I'm going to have to burn those sheets, your fox musk stench will never wash out."

"I don't take you for the girly type," he snickered as he picked up a stuffed rabbit with his paw. "This must be a bunny thing."

She stepped forward and slapped the toy from his paw. "We've got work to do fox," she snapped as she threw the black box at him. "Open that up, I've tried and its sealed shut."

"What makes you think…" he began to object, but as soon as he put a paw on the box it popped open. He reached inside and pulled out a red spandex outfit with a black cape, holding it up for the rabbit to see.

"Why would anyone give a super suit to a fox?" the rabbit grumbled. "Of all the animals in the city, they give it to you! You foxes are sneaky, selfish, pompous, devious, manipulative, arrogant, deceptive, greedy, pompous…"

"You already said that once," Nick interrupted her rant.

"Did I say arrogant?" she asked.

"Yes," he replied.

"Okay," she grumbled. "You're a FOX! What were they thinking?"

"Look they gave me this suit for a reason, so we need to figure it out," Nick sighed. "Am I supposed to end all crime, global cooling, save the tuna, WHAT?"

"Are you really that dumb?" the rabbit snapped. "Think Wilde! This city is already gripped in fear because predators are suddenly going savage. Mayor Lionheart is being impeached just because he's a predator! There are calls for rounding up all preds and putting your kind in internment camps until we figure out what is going on. Now here you come as super fox flying through the air, they'll shoot you down!"

"I'm going to try it on and see what it can do," the fox said as he began to strip. "Would you mind turning around and no peeking!"

"Like if I want to see a fox in his underwear!" Judy scoffed as she went to the dresser and dug around. Finally finding where she had stashed her last bottle of cheap whiskey, she poured a tumbler full and began drinking.

"I don't wear underwear, Carrots!" he called back.

"Don't call me Carrots!" she yelled. Turning around she started to glare at the fox who was leaning over as he was pulling on the suit's pants. Her ears blushed as she saw his naked rear end with its fluffy swishing tail and quickly she looked away.

"I saw the photo of the two rabbits on the dresser Carrots, they must be your parents," he replied. "That looks like a carrot farm in the background."

"I said DON'T CALL ME CARROTS!" she yelled.

"Calm down Fluff," he laughed. "I was only kidding."

"Don't call me Fluff either!" she grumbled.

"Snaps?" she heard him say. "Don't they believe in Velcro? All right are you ready?" He called out as he turned wearing the uniform. His smile turned into a frown when the rabbit started to laughing. "What's so funny?"

"It looks awful on you…your colors clash," the rabbit chuckled. "Scarlet red on an orange, reddish, foxish fox and is that a carrot in the center of your chest? Maybe they were supposed to give it to me and not you!"

"That's all this city needs a drunk rabbit flying into walls," Nick sarcastically remarked. "Here she comes, zooming through the air with a glass of cheap ripple in one paw!"

"At least I wouldn't cause a panic!" the rabbit grumbled as she refilled her glass.

"I guess it does kind of clash with my fur, it almost looks like it was made originally for someone else and I thought it was way too big when I started to put it on, but it seems to have shrunk a lot to fit me," Nick replied. "It also has a weird animal scent and some yellowish fur on it. Hey, I think they...they gave me a used suit!"

"Look in the box, there's a note!" the rabbit said as she reached into the case. Picking it up, she read it out loud. "Good luck with the suit, because I lost the instructions…Ralph"

"Who's Ralph?" Nick asked as he looked into the case again and pulled out a photo of a almost hairless pink skinned creature with a tuft of yellow fur on top of its head. The creature was wearing the suit. "You think that this is Ralph?"

The rabbit took a sip of her drink and looked at the photo. "That is one ugly alien," she chuckled. "Maybe we should have had the suit dry cleaned first, who knows if it has some kind of space fleas?"

"Ewww!" the fox replied. His ears were flat and he had pulled the shirt up off his belly. "You really think it has fleas?"

Judy didn't reply instead her attention was drawn to the fox's cream colored and soft looking chest fur.

Nick turned and looked at her before he asked, "What's wrong did you see something? Did you see a flea?"

The rabbit blinked and shook her head, "No, come on lets see what this thing can do."

Nick stepped out onto the fire escape landing and furtively looked around to see if anyone was watching. Looking down he winced as he saw the ground three stories below. "I don't know if I can fly and it's a long way down.

"You won't know if you don't try," the rabbit shrugged. "Now try to fly."

Nick hopped up and down yelling "fly"…nothing. "Shazzam!"...nothing. "Flame on!"...still nothing.

"Jump!" the rabbit huffed. "Just jump off the railing and think of flying."

"I'm not jumping!" the fox replied with a whine as he leaned over the railing. "It's a long way down."

He didn't hear her running at him until it was too late and her powerful kick sent him over the edge. "Gahhhh!" he yelped as he plunged down into the trash cans below, causing a clatter.

As he sat there looking up at the rabbit who was looking down at him with a grin, a voice spoke from the window behind him. "Hey mister, you're doing it wrong," a young beaver cub said. "You've got to run three steeps and then leap with your paws pointed upwards."

"Sure kit, you know how to fly!" Nick scoffed.

"That's how Super Wolf does it in the comics," the beaver replied as he held up an old comic book of a white arctic wolf in a blue and red costume.

"Give it a try!" the rabbit laughed from above.

"Three steps and leap?" he asked the kit.

"Don't forget to put your paws up!" the beaver cub reminded him.

Stepping back, Nick ran three steps before jumping with his paws in front of him. "I'm flying!" the fox exclaimed as his feet left the ground and then he panicked as he lifted off into the air and flailed around with his arms causing him to fly in a very wobbly manner.

"Well I'll be…look out!" Judy yelled from above as the fly fox slammed into a wall and bounced off.

"Hey mister!" he heard the little beaver excitedly exclaim. "You flew! You flew! You flew!"

Sitting up, the fox shook his head and grinned up at the rabbit above him. "Flying is the easy part, it's just trying to steer and land that's the hard part."

"Try it again," Judy enthusiastically called down.

"I don't know?" Nick called up to her.

Judy took a gulp from her drink, because she knew that the fox just needed more self-confidence and then with a groan, she jumped off the fire escape and yelled, "Catch me!"

"No Carrots!" the fox yipped as he sprang forward in a panic. His arms caught her midair as he soared up to her.

"We're flying!" she laughed as his arms pulled her close and without realizing it, hers looped around his neck. The fox was grinning at her as they flew down the alleyway, with the little beaver yelling and cheering as he ran below.

Nick gazed into those mesmerizing amethyst eyes which seemed to be staring back into his, before they widened with horror as she exclaimed, "Look out for that tree!"

Branches snapped as he hit the trunk with a thud, he was still holding her close as they became tangled in the pine branches. He spit out a mouth full of sticky needles before saying, "Sorry Carrots, I wasn't watching where I was going."

"That's okay Slick," she replied. For some reason she had begun blushing before she snarled, "Just get your paw off my tail!"

The fox quickly moved his paw from the fluffy object and he began to say that he was sorry, when suddenly the branch snapped and they crashed into a heap on the ground. She was now on top of him with her nose almost touching his. "Are you two now going to kiss," the beaver asked. "Super Wolf has a girlfriend named Lois and they kiss after he saves her."

The rabbit's ears shot up as she leapt off the bemused fox. "Of course we aren't going to kiss!" she stuttered. "He's a fox!"

"Well he seems like a nice fox," the kit replied. "Not at all like the sly, devious, no good…"

"Thanks!" Nick said, cutting the beaver's on going list off before it got too long. "I like you too kit, what's your name?"

"It's Timmy Turntail," the beaver grinned.

"We Timmy you need to keep this secret," Nick replied. "You know like Super Wolf has a secret identity."

"Yes sir!" Timmy enthusiastically said as he saluted. "It will be our secret!"

"Okay Slick," the rabbit said as she walked in front of them and into the alley. "You've crashed three stories into trash cans, smacked into a wall hard enough to chip some bricks, and now hit a pine tree with enough force to jar my fillings loose. All of that and you don't even have a scratch on you, so I wonder if that makes you invulnerable?"

Nick looked towards her just in time to see her foot paw as it smashed across his muzzle. He staggered back more from the shock then from the blow. "Hey, why did you do that?" he yelled.

The rabbit was on the ground rubbing her foot and she looked up at him. "That was like kicking a steel pole!" she whined. "I almost hurt myself, I've dropped wolves with a kick like that and so do tell me didn't it hurt at all?"

"No!" the fox answered. "I barely felt it."

"So you're somewhat invulnerable," Judy said as she stood and limped away. Then she turned and drew her gun and fired point blank at Nick. The dart struck the startled fox in the chest and bounced off. Before he could react she grabbed a metal pipe from the ground and hit him with it, but he caught the pipe's end and effortlessly lifted her off the ground.

"Are we finished?" he sarcastically asked. "I didn't know rabbits were so mean?"

"Bend the pipe," she answered.

"I can't bend a steel pipe!" he scoffed.

"Super Wolf could!" the little beaver excitedly said.

The fox sighed as he gripped the pipe with both paws and was astonished when he effortlessly bent the pipe in half.

"Super strength, invulnerability, flight…so what else can Super Wolf do?" the rabbit asked the beaver who handed her an old torn up comic book.

"I remember those comics," Nick said. "They stopped making them years ago."

"Yeah, now you can only get comics like Steel Ram, Ultra Hind, Streaky the Rabbit, Super Bull and they're no fun," the beaver sighed. "The bad guys are always a tiger, wolf, or fox and are never smart. Maybe you can show everyone that a fox can be a hero too!"

Nick just stood there with his shoulders slumped and his ears drooped as he realized why they gave the suit to a fox.


	6. Research and Development

**Chapter 6: Research and Development**

 _ **It's another I Love the 80's Flashback Friday and time to party hardy, so stop spazzing! You need to chill with another story. (Yeah, I totally got that out of my system dude.)**_

 **During part one of** _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ **pilot episodes, Ralph sees his son watching the** _ **"Superfriends"**_ **cartoon show on their TV and this helps him decide to keep the suit. The 1980's marked the ending of the Bronze Age of comics and also brought us some of the greatest classic comic books and graphic novels ever written by that indomitable genius Alan Moore with** _ **Batman**_ **:** _ **The Killing Joke**_ **,** _ **Superman:**_ _ **Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?**_ , _**V for Vendett** **a**_ **,** **and his** _ **Watchmen**_ **series.**

 **So put on your smiley face button before you sit back and enjoy tonight's chapter. Hey, my button has a** **blood spatter on it!**

* * *

Judy sat on her bed surrounded by a pile both old and new comics that they had borrowed from the little beaver cub, she looked over in surprise at Nick who was softly growling as he read a comic at the other end of the bed. Complaining that the suit was uncomfortable to wear, the fox had changed back into his tacky green Pawaiian tropical shirt and his pants. "What's the matter Slick?" she asked.

"They've turned Robin Hood into villain," he snarled. "Robin Hood! In this comic, he's stealing from the poor and keeping the money. Everyone knows he only took from the rich to give back to the poor!"

"All of these new comics make predators the bad guys and never the heroes," she sighed tossing the one she was reading aside and pick up comic book she that she shook at the fox. "In this one, the evil lion threatens to eat the poor lamb!"

"Hearts and minds," the fox shrugged. "Poison the brains of the next generation, for fear brings power and power corrupts."

Her paw hesitated as she picked up an old comic called The Cape. It was about a hooded grey hare in a large cape, he had all kinds of gadgets he wore in pockets around his body. The cape was black and was magical, so it could withstand fire and knives. He not only fought the bad guys in paw to paw combat, but also used smoke bombs, boomerangs and other gadgets. She put that comic aside and picked up one about a masked red fox who was a master with the sword as he fought to free his city from an evil mayor and his army of goons.

She sat back in her bed and stared up at the ceiling. "Wolfie said the answer is in the bulbs?" she spoke out loud. "But your friends drove off with the bulbs. I wish we knew where they went and why those flower bulbs are so important?"

"Then we need to find Finn," the fox answered. "You still have that fancy police car?"

"I took it back while you were sleeping," she replied.

"You mean drugged," Nick sarcastically scoffed.

"Whatever!" the rabbit huffed back. "I figured that my career was over because I borrowed the cruiser without permission."

"You stole a police car!" the fox exclaimed as he sat up with a surprised look on his face. "You really stole a cop car?"

"Kind of…well yes," she sighed. "I procured it without permission but when I got back to the station, the motor pool supervisor didn't turn me in like she should have. She said that my accomplice told her what was going on and she didn't want him to get into trouble, you see he's a cheetah."

"I thought they had already either fired or ran off most of the cops who were preds?" Nick commented as he picked up another comic and leafed through it.

"Priscilla is the supervisor and she pointed out something I hadn't thought of before. She said once they finish cracking down on the obvious preds, like tigers, wolves, and you foxes, they might go after the omnivores and she's a pig," Judy replied.

"Yeah Carrots, they've already gone after the coons and possums," the fox added. "The black bands rule the streets, not even you prey are safe from their reach."

"When I was at the station I saw some cops with black arm bands," the rabbit replied. "They were a little heavy pawed."

"A LITTLE HEAVY PAWED?" Nick growled. "They put more than one fox in the clinic for no good reason! The only safe places in town are Tundratown and the Nocturnal Districts, those areas are still somewhat pred tolerant."

Judy set her comic down and looked over at the fox. Nick was agitated, his tail was whipping back and forth as he stared back at her. "Well Slick, I guess we need to find your buddy," she said. "Why don't you give him a call?"

"On what?" the fox grumbled. "When you can't get work, you can't buy a phone."

"Doesn't the city have that low income assisted phone service?" she asked. "Why don't you use that?"

"Ha! You think that's available for preds?" Nick scoffed. "We don't qualify for those anymore or most of the other welfare assistance plans."

"Wait? There are no laws that would deny any citizen access to those programs!" Judy said as she sat up in on her bed. "In fact, there are laws that make it illegal to deny someone qualified from access those programs based on their species, religion, gender, or sexual orientation."

"Laws are only good if you have someone who will enforce them," Nick shrugged. "Even if the cops did, you would still have to have a district attorney who will press the charges, a judge who cares, and even one that will allow a jury of your peers instead of all prey animals. There's no such thing as justice for predators and defiantly for foxes anymore."

The rabbit began boxing up the comic books as she listened, her paw hesitated on the comic called The Cape and she placed it aside next to one about Super Wolf. "I knew it was bad, but not that bad," she sighed. The thirst was back and she looked over at the bottle of whisky, desperately wanting a shot but she knew she needed to stay sober. "Okay Slick, I going to change out of my uniform and into some street clothes. Then we need to find your friend."

She started to remove her chest plate, when she noticed that he was still watching her with a smirk on his face. "Turn around Chompers," she snapped. "This isn't a Play Bunny peepshow!"

Nick laughed as he stood and walked to face the door. "Embarrassed Fluff?" he chuckled. "Maybe you're afraid that the Big Bad Fox will eat you?"

"Nope fox, I could drop you like a sack of potatoes. These paws have knocked out a rhino before Slick," she laughed back. For some reason, she blushed as she pulled her shirt off before she slipped on a pink and blue checkered cotton blouse and sat down on the bed to pull off her pants. "Besides that saying is the Big Bad Wolf."

"I didn't take you for the kind of rabbit to wear pink panties?" the fox said in a wryly voice.

She quickly looked up and over at him as she wigged into her jeans, only to realize that she forgot about the mirror hanging on the back of the door. "You son of a…" she snarled as she reached towards her tube of fox repellent.

"Ah…ah…ah… he turned to face her as he wagged a digit at her. He was grinning now and she blushed when she realized that he was rather handsome…for a fox. "You didn't think I knew you watched me as I changed into and out of the suit. It was only fair that I saw you changeling, but after all you at least have underwear."

She grumbled as she put the tube of repellent back down. "We don't have time for this," she snapped. "Let's get these comics back to Timmy and the go find your friend."

They delivered the box of comics back to the little beaver, telling him that they kept a couple for research purposes. Nick had shoved his suit into a shopping bag and as he began to walk towards the bus stop, Judy called out, "Where you going Slick?"

"We need to catch the 5413 downtown and then the subway to Happy Town," he called back. "I hope you got some cash, because I 'm broke."

"I'll drive," she shouted back.

He turned to see that she was leaning on a cherry red sports car.

"Oooohhh!" the fox exclaimed. "Can I drive?"

"No, it's a rental," the rabbit replied with a grin. "Besides, a fox driving a car this nice would get us pulled over within a block."

"So, a rabbit driving a fox around doesn't look at all suspicious?" the fox scoffed.

"You're right, get in the trunk!" she sighed while trying to keep from laughing. "You know that you could always fly us there instead."

"Sure Fluff, you've seen me flying with all that wobbling and then there are my landings," Nick replied with a smirk. "You trust me enough to put your life in my paws?"

"Yeah, that's not happening Slick," she sarcastically answered as she climbed into the driver's seat. "I'll drive, but you have to duck if you see a cop."

"Ten four!" he replied with a smirk, as he gave her a lazy mock salute. "I'll play like a mallard and quack right to it."

She revved the engine playfully before she pulled the car out onto the street and towards Happy Town. Nick couldn't help but joke, "Are we there yet?"

"Shut up!" was her response.

It took them about forty minutes to wind their way down the backstreets towards Happy Town, where Nick was hoping to find his friend Finn. They took the long route, avoiding the main roads where cops might be waiting. Judy rolled her eyes and couldn't help but smile at the fox's endless chatter. He even got her to laugh a few times during the trip. Finally they reached the alley where Finn usually parked his van.

"He's not here?" the fox said. "He always parks here, this is his spot!"

"Maybe he took the cash and ran," the rabbit sighed.

"Not Finn, he would never do that to me," Nick shook his head and looked around with concern. "We're best buds, he never would dump me."

"Ah, he dumped you in the middle of the Canyonlands," she pointed out.

He gave her a look, before shaking his head and replying, "No, somethings wrong! Park here and we'll ask around, maybe he left me a message with one of the store owners?"

Judy wheeled the car into the alleyway. "The car better be here and still in one piece when we get back!" she muttered. "With all its tires too! I know the kind of mammals that live around here, they're all thieves and lowlifes."

"Hey!" the fox growled. "I live around here!"

"Yeah, I know," Judy replied with a grin.

She watched as Nick took a piece of cardboard and wrote a symbol on it with a pen before tucking it under a windshield wiper. "There, now no one will dare touch it!" he proclaimed.

"What does that mean?" Judy asked as she looked at the markings drawn on the cardboard.

"It's the symbol for a guy that I used to work for over in Tundratown," Nick shrugged. "No one messes with him and his gang."

They went from store to store, but no one had seen the little fennec fox since the day before. Finally, Nick saw a familiar brown weasel nervously looking around as he frantically pulled a duffle bag towards the bus stop.

"Weaselton!" Nick yelled as he and Judy ran toward the weasel, who panicky looked at them and then the bag containing all his life's belongings.

"Don't you try to run!" Judy yelled as she pulled her dart gun out from its holster hidden behind her back. "I'm a cop and I'll dart you before turning you over to those other police officers with the black bands."

The frightened weasel gave a string of creative curses as he raised his paws over his head. The fox reached him first and grabbed his shirt, yanking Weaselton off his feet. "Where's Finn!" Nick snarled.

"They got him Wilde, I ran and barely escaped that place!" the weasel whined. "You need to run too! The things they are doing to us preds is horrible!"

"Who are you talking about?" Judy snapped at him. "Who did you leave Finn with?"

"A group of rams, they're making some kind of concoction out of those bulbs that will make a mammal go loopy, all snarls and howls!" Weaselton whimpered. "And then there are those collars that will shock you!"

"Where is Finn!" the fox growled, showing his teeth.

"The old asylum in the Meadowlands," Weaselton whimpered as he flinched from the fox's fangs. "Cliffside! May the gods help him, he's in Cliffside!"


	7. The Asylem of Doom

**Chapter 7: Asylum of Doom**

* * *

 **Our Flashback Friday Fiesta continues with another chapter of _The_** _ **Greatest Zooptopian Hero**_ **. Nick and Judy are going to rescue poor Finn from the infamous Cliffside Asylum.**

 **The role of Ralph Hinkley was played by William Katt, who had already starred in several movies and television shows. He previously stared in the horror flick** _ **Carrie**_ **, as the unfortunate Tommy Ross. His mother was the legendary Barbara Hale, who is well known for playing Raymond Barr's legal secretary in the long running television show** _ **Perry Mason.**_ **After** _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ **was cancelled, William Katt continues his career in television, films, and does voice acting as well. He has also written a comic book based on the series and does the comic con circuit.**

 **Does anyone out there know why the producers briefly changed Ralph's name from Hinkley to Hanley?**

* * *

The red fox held the shivering weasel close to his bared fangs and growled. Suddenly there was the sound of sirens and the squeal of tires as a police cruiser slammed to a stop in the middle of the street in front of them. Two burly rams in police uniforms jumped out of the vehicle with their taser rifles leveled at the fox, weasel, and rabbit.

"That's the weasel!" one of the uniformed cops proclaimed. "Don't let him escape."

Judy looked over at the two officers in their blue uniforms and grimaced when she saw the black bands on their sleeves. "Wilde run!" she whispered. "Get the suit on or we're all but done for." The fox's eyes widened as he looked at her before he unceremoniously dropped the weasel and ran.

"Freeze!" one of the cops yelled as he lifted his rifle, which crackled with electricity as it came to life. "Stop fox or I'll fire!"

"STAND DOWN ROOKIE!" Judy yelled as she showed her badge. "You two idiots just screwed up an undercover investigation that took months to prepare!"

The larger ram lowered his weapon in confusion, but the smaller ram baaed at him, "She just a cop and you know our mission, grab the weasel. "

With a curse, Judy sprang at the angry cop as he lifted and aimed his gun at the fox who was running down the alleyway. Her foot paw knocked the gun aside causing it to harmlessly discharge into the nearby wall and as she landed, she spun while drawing and firing her dart gun at the larger ram. The big cop staggered as the tranquilizer began to take effect. Satisfied she turned and faced the second cop and watched as he drew a wicked looking steel baton.

"Rookies!" she snarled as she ducked his swing and then leaped to catch him with a double kick across his snout. "All brawn and no brains!"

The blows caused the ram to stagger, but shaking his head he raised the baton again and swung down at the rabbit. She rolled under his swing and picked up his comrade's fallen rifle and fired, unfortunately for the ram the smaller animal was no taller than his waist in height. He uttered a high pitched scream as the voltage coursed through his body before finally collapsing snout first onto the street.

"Like I said, rookies," the angry rabbit spat out at the cowering weasel.

"Don't tell me I missed everything?" Nick called out as he stumbled from the alleyway while still pulling on the suit's pants.

"You really need to work on your timing Slick," Judy sighed. "What took you so long?"

"It's these things that fit over my foot paws," the fox grumbled. "I mean who covers their paws?"

"Just get these guys off the street and someplace safe," Judy replied as she shook her head. She leaned over and removed their dart guns, radios, and cell phones. "I'll pull the car into the alleyway and out of sight.

"Nice pajamas Wilde," Duke scoffed. He had stopped cowering and shaking enough to return to his obnoxious ways. His eyes went wide when the fox effortlessly picked up not one, but both of the larger rams with what appeared to be no effort at all. "How did you do that?"

"I've been working out Westleing," the fox replied as he gave the weasel one of his trademarked smirks. "That and vitamins, you should try them." He looked around the alleyway and then not so gently plopped the officers into a big steel garbage bin, before stepping out of the way as the rabbit wheeled the patrol cruiser past him. Yanking the radio's microphone out if the radio, she tossed it a nearby trashcan.

"It's Weaselton!" the weasel snapped.

"We need to weigh the top of that bin closed so they can't crawl out," Judy said as she looked around.

"I've got just the thing," Nick replied as he walked over and lifted another trash bin like as if it was an empty box and gently stacked it on top of the other one. "That should do it!"

Weaselton looked at the fox with wide eyes and then at the huge bin he had just effortlessly lifted. Suddenly the weasel's eyes rolled upwards and he passed out.

"You're stronger than I thought," Judy mused. "Leave the suit on, we'll need it when we get to the asylum."

Nick looked down at the unconscious weasel. "What are we going to do with him?" he asked. "We just can't leave him here?"

"No, we can't and so he's going to have to come with us," she sighed as she watched the fox struggle to get his pants and shirt over the suit. The suit's red sleeves poked out under the short sleeved green tropical shirt, making the fox look absolutely ridiculous.

"I look like an idiot!" he whined as his ears folded back and he gave her an upset look.

"No more than usual," she laughed. "Stay here and I'll be right back with the car."

He watched her walk off down the sidewalk, before leaning against the alleyway wall. A passerby stopped, looked him over and then at the weasel who was still crumpled on the ground. "Drunk again," Nick said and gave the skeptical goat a shrug.

"Predators!" the old goat huffed as he continued along the sidewalk.

A few minutes the cherry red sports car pulled up to the curb. "Throw him in the backseat," Judy said. "Then toss his bag into the trunk."

"We should throw him in the trunk and his bag in the backseat," Nick chuckled and then he suddenly looked at her with a smirk. "Yikes, I'm starting to act like you!"

"Shut it fox and let's get going," she snapped. "You've got a friend to save and I want to know what they are doing with those bulbs."

She ditched the rental with the bound up weasel about half a mile from the long winding drive that led to Cliffside Asylum. The massive modernist building was built during the turn of the century on an island in the center of the river that was clung to at the very edge of a great waterfall. The structure was abandoned decades ago when the city's government began to change their policies on the treatment of the mentally ill and few knew that it had been recently reopened with a new more sinister purpose, as a research center for the study of predators. This is where those unfortunate souls who had regressed to their primitive ways were contained along with other "volunteers" who "actively participated" in the development of what some considered the necessary tools to suppress a mammal's aggressive tendencies either by surgical or mechanical means.

Judy and Nick crouched in the bushes overlooking the long narrow causeway that led from the guard shack to the building's entry. The long bridge afforded no cover and therefore the chance of crossing it undetected was impossible even in the darkness of the night.

"So Fluff, do you have any ideas on how we get in?" Nick whispered to the rabbit. "There doesn't look like anyway in but across that bridge."

"I considered using the cables under the bridge," Judy answered. "If you were Super Wolf, you could have zoomed into the building and flown everyone out."

"Carrots, if I was Super Wolf I'd capture all the bad guys and turn them over to the cops," Nick snickered in response. "The only problem is the cops are in on this too!"

"Good point," the rabbit grunted as she wiggled into another position. "And don't call me Carrots!"

"Look there is a drainage pipe that leads into the building just above the falls," she whispered. "Do you think you could at least fly us into that?"

"I'm not sure, do you trust me enough to do that?" the fox whimpered. "If I miss, it's a long way down."

"We've got to try!" she snapped. "I'm sure you can do it Slick."

Still looking unsure, he bent to pick her up in his arms but she shook her head no and instead hopped upon his back. Once she was secure, he ran and jumped. His flight was more wobbly then soaring as he flew towards the opening, suddenly he panicked and began to drop. "Slick!" Judy hissed into his ear. "Concentrate!" The fox leveled off, but it was still apparent that he was going to miss the pipe.

"Hold on Carrots!" he yelped in fear.

Judy reached up and grabbed his ears, yanking his head to the right and upward. Surprisingly the fox's body followed that angle and when she pulled them slightly back to the left he changed course. They were now heading straight towards the opening. He closed his eyes as they glided into the hole and tumbled along the filthy wet tiles before skidding to a stop in a pool of slime.

"Sweet cheese and crackers, that was close!' Judy snapped as she climbed off the fox's back and grimaced as her foot paws sank into something furry but wet.

"You're on my tail fluff!" the fox muttered as he sat up and began to wipe himself off. "This place stinks!" Standing up, He shook himself off much to the chagrin of his partner who was splattered by the filthy muck that came off of him.

"Stop that!" she harshly whispered.

"Hey Carrots look!" Nick laughed. "The suits self-cleaning…dry cleaning at that!" She looked up at his and he was already dry, without a single spot of filth remaining on the suit. She on the other paw was still wet and nasty.

"Now where do we go from here?" he whispered as he followed her, they slowly crept down the pipe.

She didn't answer, but kept crawling upwards. Finally she looked back at him and he had stopped but was staring at her with a perplexed look. "What's with that creepy look?" she hissed.

"Doesn't Super Wolf have x-ray vision?" he asked with a growing smirk.

"Yeah…maybe" she tentatively replied. "Why?"

"Well I do!" he replied with a grin. "That is unless you took your clothes off."

"Slick!" she gasped as she tried to cover herself with her paws. "You can see through my clothes?"

"Don't worry fluff, I can't see anything but your bones," he chuckled.

"Look somewhere else!" she grumbled as he returned to crawling along the pipe.

"Whoa!" she heard him gasp and turned to see him grinning and looking at her again with a paw covering one eye. "No bones now or clothes, I like this super power!"

"Stop looking!" she snapped. "You're a Pervert! Now use that x-ray vision to find your friend."

He looked up above him and squinted. "Carrots there so many mammals in cages above us," he said. "What is going on here?"

"Try concentrating," she snapped as she wiggled down the tunnel. "Focus!"

The fox looked up and squinted harder. "I just…just can't make out…what!" he yelped as a pair of heat beams tore out of his eyes and burned through the floors above.

"Slick, close your eyes!" Judy yelled.

The fox closed his eyes and then slowly peeked only to find out that everything was back to normal with his eyesight, except there was now a gaping hole that showed straight through the building's many floors to reveal the sky above. Alarms were clanging and he heard the sounds of mammals running to and fro. "I think they know we're here," he muttered.

* * *

 **Next chapter: Its fox vs elephant as Nick's secret is revealed.**


	8. The Battle for Cliffside

**Chapter 8: The Battle for Cliffside**

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 **Happy Friday and another grueling week of school or of work is over! Tonight on our I Love the 80's Flashback Friday story,** _ **The Greatest Zootopian Hero, we**_ **read as our fox and bunny battle the bad guys.**

 **In television show** _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ **, Ralph's superpowers included flying, super strength, and some invulnerability to injury. During the show's three seasons, he also learned that he could become invisible, use telekinesis, super speed, x-ray vision (yep, Nick found that out the fun way), holographic vision, pyrokinesis (shades of Carrie!),** **extrasensory perception, and the ability to shrink. Nick discovered in our story that it gave him heat vision or did he actually use pyrokinesis and didn't realize it?**

 **So put down that** **Rubik's Cube, yes the one you bought at Toys "R" Us in 1982 during the height of the puzzle's fad and still haven't solved, so you can read tonight's exciting chapter!**

* * *

The fox in the red costume looked up in wonder at what he had just done. His heat ray vision had burned its way through the concrete reinforced floors and left a gaping hole above him, panicked mammals with wide eyes looked down at him from the sides of the still smoldering gap. Alarms were ringing and he could hear the sounds of foot paws running around as orders were being yelled out to them.

"Slick what did you do?" the rabbit snapped as she slid through the muck to reach his side. She gaped as she looked upwards. "How…how…how did you do THAT?"

"I guess I stared too hard," was all that Nick could think of as an answer. "Now what do we do?"

"Get up there and find your friend and the bulbs," Judy answered as she drew her dart gun and shook her head, they were going to be seriously under armed. "You need to fly us up to the second floor, that's were all those mammals in cages are, right?"

Nick looked at her, there was fear in his eyes and he was beginning to panic. "Then what are we going to do? It just us two against who knows what!" he whimpered.

"We improvise and pray that the suit is as good as we need it to be," she answered as she climbed onto his back. The fox jumped several times, but he didn't seem to be leaving the ground. "Calm down fox! Three steps and jump remember, three steps and jump."

He nodded and ran his three steps and jumped into the air, lifting wobbly upwards into the hole. As they passed the first floor, Judy saw that it was being used for the storage of equipment and was generally empty. However, she noted several large armored trucks and what looked like boxes of weapons. The second floor was another matter, as they landed on the white tile floor she saw that it was some kind of laboratory with cages stuffed with all sizes of mammals and not of whom were predators. She turned to face a dozen ewes and rams in lab coats that we staring back at her in fear and then she realized it wasn't her they were looking at, it was Nick.

The door from the hallway bust open and several armed rams in black combat fatigues rushed in and faced the fox with their taser rifles. For a moment there was confusion, before one of the rams in a white coat baaed out loud enough to be heard over the clanging alarms and screaming mammals, "Shoot him!"

There was a cackling of their rifles as they discharged their weapons at the picnicked fox. "Nick!" Judy yelled as the taser rounds hit him. She knew that there was enough electricity given off by the rifles to fry any mammal, even a rhino.

"Nick!" he heard her cry out and he looked over towards the rabbit. He winced as the taser barbs hit his body and was surprised that they just bounced off onto the floor, where as they discharged, they danced, sparked, and wiggled uselessly across the tile.

"GET HIM!" the ram yelled again. He looked over towards the fat mammal in the white coat and then back at the dozen armed guards who were now rushing at him with knives and black steel batons.

"Enough," he snarled as he charged into the guards. He was surprised by his own strength as he began tossing the larger muscular mammals around, a knife shattered on his shoulder and so did the jaw of the ram who welded it as his paw punched him. Another guard beat at him with his steel baton as still another tried to grab his arm. He slammed both of them against the wall, before he grasped another guard's armored vest and threw him into the metal door. Several of the rams just ran away as he turned to face them.

"Let them go!" Judy yelled and at first he thought that she was talking to him, but then Nick realized that she was standing in front of a white coated sheep, with a taser rifle in her paws.

Before anyone could reply, the doors into the room were kicked open again and Judy's ears flicked as she heard over the screaming and the growling of mammals, a loud rapid whirling noise. She turned to see Nick staggering and then being tossed across the room by a hail of bullets. Standing in the doorway was a female elephant in a blue police uniform holding a smoking multiple barreled minigun. "Hopps!" the cop yelled. "I should have known that you'd turn on your own kind." The beast swung and aimed her gun at the smaller rabbit.

"Pennington!" Judy snapped. "You're in on this too?"

Before the pachyderm could open fire, her eyes went wide in surprise as she saw the fox stand up seemingly unhurt. "I almost felt that!" Nick remarked as he gave a smirk and wiped some dust off his sleeve.

Judy looked behind her and saw that the fox was standing in front of a bullet riddled wall. "How did you survive?" Francine Pennington exclaimed. "That's impossible!" Her gun whirled to life again, firing round after round into the fox who at first staggered under the impact of the bullets. The fox covered his face with his arms and his eyes glowed red as he concentrated on the weapon. Suddenly a red beam of light shot from out from his eyes and struck the gun's barrels causing them to glow red before melting.

The rabbit watched as the elephant dropped the smoldering gun, but then she saw that someone else had stepped into the room and the rabbit ducked just as a sharp grey object sailed past her head before thumping into the wall behind her. "You're a bloody fast piece of fluff!" the wallaby in the black combat fatigues laughed. He had a set of deadly looking boomerangs in his paws. "Let's see if you can dance too!"

Judy fired her dart gun, but the hopper flicked the round out of the air with one of his boomerangs, while launching the other at her. She dropped down and twisted as the deadly object just missed her. As she came back up, she bounced against a desk and launched herself at her assailant.

"Bloody…" the wallaby exclaimed as the fell backwards to avoid her kick. Before he could react, Judy had spun again and her foot paw caught the mammal across his muzzle.

Nick looked over as the rabbit sent the wallaby staggering and then he turned towards at the elephant again, she was struggling while trying to pull her useless gun harness off and it finally fell with a loud thump onto the ground. Trumpeting, she charged at him, he tried to say something witty, but instead nervously stared at the approaching large mammal. He jumped when suddenly something metal snapped around his waist and looked down to see a metal whip had encircled him.

"Fry fox!" the whip's holder laughed as he pushed a button and thousands of electrical volts course thought the whip and into Nick's body, causing the fox's hair to rise, but Nick still stood.

"That tingled!" Nick chuckled. Just then the elephant had reached him and her huge hoof stomped down to crush him. Frantically the costumed fox put his paws up to stop the heavy blow and as he did so the electricity which filled his body crackled into the elephant causing her to scream, her eyes fluttered up into her head and she tottered before crashing down on top of the whip toting warthog.

"Opps, sorry!" Nick said as he looked at the two unconscious mammals.

"Blimey!" he heard the wallaby exclaimed as he threw one of his boomerangs at the fox, it just bounced off. There was a twang and the hopper fell forward with a tranquilizer dart stuck in his rear end.

Judy stood with a grin on her face, she was panting from the fight. "Never turn your back on us rabbits," she said as she kicked the fallen wallaby. Then turning, she realized that during the fight the small group of ewes and rams in lab coats had disappeared. She tugged on a heavy steel door, but it was locked. "They got away Slick!"

Nick began walking towards the door, but Judy shook her head. "Get the cages open first, our priority is to get these guys free and to safety," she snapped at him. Digging around, she found a set of keys and moved to unlock the doors to a cage.

"Stop!" a familiar voice yelled to her.

She looked over at a cage with several mammals in it and saw a scruffy looking tiger in a torn police uniform inside. "Fangmeyer?" she asked. "What are you doing here?"

"I was ambushed while meeting Wolford and Delgato about a week ago and they hauled me down here," he answered. "Those mammals in the cages are infected with some kind of drug that makes them go feral, don't let them out!"

"Where's Delgato?" she asked as she tried to look into the packed cages.

"In a cage on the other side," Fangmeyer replied. The rabbit turned and saw the naked male lion growling as he paced back and forth on all four paws. "They gave him the serum and now he's gone savage."

She went to the tiger's cage and unlocked it, letting everyone out. As Fangmeyer stood in front of her, she saw he had a collar with some kind with a yellow glowing light. "What is that thing on your neck?" she asked.

"It's a shock collar, it goes off anytime I get angry or feel any kinds of extreme emotions. He walked over to the where the unconscious guards were sprawled and dug around in their pockets. "No keys!"

Nick began unlocking more of the cages and letting their occupants out. "Finn!" he yelled. "Finn, where are you?"

"Wilde!" he heard a deep voice answer as the small fennec fox shoved his way up to the larger fox. "Is that the super suit and does it really work?"

Judy watched as the red fox leaned over and hugged his friend, she had to smile as she saw Nick's tail was happily wagging. "Okay, we need to get organized," she sighed as she looked up at the tiger. "How do we get out of here with everyone? I can hear that there are more security guards waiting for us in the hallway."

"First we need to find Doctor Madge Honey Badger," the tiger growled. "And then we need to get Savage!"

* * *

 **Next week: Nick learns something surprising about his past.**

 **Author's Notes: Yep, my three special guards are parodies of comic book characters. The boomerang throwing Wallaby is based on DC Comic's Captain Boomerang, Francine Pennington with the minigun is "inspired" by a drawing of DC Comic's Bane** **, and the electric whip welding warthog is based on Marvel Comic's Whiplash.**


	9. A Family Tradition

**Chapter 9: A Family Tradition**

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 **Happy Flashback Friday and the tulips are blooming on the farm this lovely evening, so its time for another chapter of _The Greatest Zootopian Hero_! Things are really getting exciting in our story as the rescue continues. **

**So the symbol on the super suit is not a carrot like Judy suggested. The show's creator Stephen J. Cannell once said that the chest symbol was inspired by a pair of square-handled scissors that he kept on his desk. When he was discussing what kind of symbol that the costume should have on it with the costume's designer, the designer picked up the scissors and suggested that was the answer. The symbol also resembles the Chinese character for "** _ **center".**_ **I still think it looks like a carrot with wings.**

 **It's time to sit back and enjoy a nice soft drink while you read tonight's exciting chapter. I would recommend a nice tall glass of New Coke…yeah, I remember that in 1985 they tried to tell us that "the best just got better..!" but it didn't. Me, I think I would prefer a nice glass of TAB on ice which is another Coca Cola product that they no longer make. I wonder if Pepsi had these kinds of problems? Oh right, they once had Aspen and Apple Slice!**

* * *

Officer Judy Hopps looked up in confusion at the tiger in the torn police uniform. "What do you mean by getting savage?" she asked. "Isn't that what you said they did to those poor caged mammals?"

Former police officer Richard Fangmeyer looked down at her and although he appeared worn out, there was determination and anger in his eyes. "I meant Agent Jack Savage, he growled. "He and his partner were our contact that night, we didn't make it but Wolford did escape." Looking over at Nick, he shook his head and added, "I can see that Wolford made it to her…the alien in time."

"How do you know about the aliens?" Judy asked in surprise.

"Some of your questions can be answered behind that door," Fangmeyer replied. "Doctor Madge Honey Badger was in contact with the alien before she was kitnapped."

The door was massive and made from heavy steel plate, the handle had no keyhole but there was a digital key box on the wall. "You're up Slick!" Judy called to Nick. "Let's see if you can punch your way inside."

"That'll be a waste of time," a voice spoke from the crowd of mammals behind her and she saw a raccoon in orange prison garb shoving his way towards her. He had one of those collars around his neck, which was surrounded by charred and burnt fur. "No matter how strong your pal is the only thing his pounding will do is to bring down the building on top of us before it gives way and the same thing will happen if he tries to put a hole in the wall."

As the raccoon approached the key box, he ran a paw along its sides as he looked it over. "No picking this lock," he sighed. "It requires a rental scan and I'm sure none of our pals over there are authorized."

Judy looked over at the still unconscious guards, who had been stripped of their weapons and gear and unceremoniously dumped into one of the locked cells. Several of the freed mammals had barricaded the door to the hallway. She looked back and saw that the raccoon was peering closer at the lock. "Hey fox, can you pull this out of the wall?" he asked with a grin.

Nick walked over to the box and grabbed it with his paws. "Do you want it all the way out?" he asked and when the raccoon nodded, he gave it a yank and ripped it out of the wall.

The raccoon quickly grabbed the wires and looked them over before finding the set he wanted and touching two wires together, the door clicked open. "There we go!" he announced.

"Runnel, I'd hate to think what you could have accomplished with your life if you had applied those talents to something besides burglary!" Fangmeyer dryly stated as he shook his head at the grinning raccoon.

The ringtailed bandit replied with a smile and a shrug. "Some of us are just beyond redemption Stripes," he replied.

Inside they found a laboratory that appeared to have been ransacked. Chemicals dumped into the drains, equipment tossed around or broken, and the groaning body of a one armed badger wearing a white lab coat pawcuffed to a table. "They're gone and they took my research with them," the badger said as she tried to sit up. "All my prototypes and blueprints too."

The rabbit ran over to the handcuffed badger, the doctor looked exhausted and had scars from being beaten. "They took your prototypes and blueprints for what?" Judy asked. "Just what were you making?"

"Weapons, I was making weapons for them," the doctor cried. "They made me make weapons to use to round up all us predators. I didn't have a choice….my pups!"

"Mommy!" a small female badger pup, who looked no more than ten, cried out as she ran to the doctor. "Mommy!"

"Amelia!" she sighed. "You're safe, thank the gods you're safe. Where's your brother?"

"Max is with the others barricading the door," the pup sniffled. "He said hurry before they zap us all with the collars."

The raccoon had joined them and started looking the pawcuffs over, then he jammed his claw into the lock and within moments had picked it. He tossed them over to the tiger. "I told you I have magic claws," he laughed. "Those are just standard issued police cuffs, piece of cake."

"We never could keep you in pawcuffs Jake," the tiger sighed.

The doctor stood up and began to rummage through a desk until she found a metallic prosthetic arm. Pressing a button, she pulled out a cord out and plugged the it into an electrical socket. "They may have made me make their weapons, but I built safety overrides into each of my creations," she grimly said. A panel slid open on the arm and she pressed a sequence of keys inside, immediately the collars went dark. "I've deactivated the shock collars, so everyone needs to take them off before they reactivate them."

Nick watched as the word filtered through the crowd and the mammals began removing their collars. The raccoon gingerly removed his, to reveal exposed and blistered skin underneath. Jake noticed the fox was looking at his mangled neck. "Yeah, they hurt when they go off!" the coon sighed. "I tried to escape twice and they zapped me really good both times after they caught me, tortured me with it. After the second escape, their leader Doug Ramsey threatened to use his formula on me and turn me savage. He said he always wanted to see a feral wolf tear a raccoon apart with its jaws."

"Speaking of Savage," Fangmeyer suddenly said as he looked around. "Where is Agent Savage?"

"Third door to the left," Doctor Honey Badger replied as she fiddled with her prosthetic limb, trying to slide it over the stump of her arm. The raccoon named Jake helped her slip it on and then attached the wires. The doctor held the still plugged in arm up and flexed its metal fingers. "Better, much better."

Nick and Fangmeyer walked up to the door, it was made from stout wood and was locked. "You want to open this door Jake?" the tiger called over to the raccoon.

But before the burglar could react, the fox splintered the door with a single punch. "I've always wanted to do that!" he snickered.

As they walked in, the room's lights automatically cut on. "It's about bloody time you got here!" a voice spoke from inside. They saw the long slender and very naked light grey with black stripes furred jackrabbit buck strapped against the wall, there were welts and cuts across his body where he had been tortured.

"Jack!" Fangmeyer cried out as he ran to release the agent from his binds, as Nick helped the hare stand.

There was a small gasp and Nick looked up to see Judy standing in the doorway, looking at the agent. She blushed and turned away. "We need to figure out how we can get out of here!" she snapped.

Jack gave a thin, almost ghost of a smile at the blushing rabbit as he hobbled over to the table where his clothes had been laid. Gingerly he pulled on his pants and then with even more care, he pulled on his torn white dress shirt over his wounds. "I've already worked out an escape plan," he announced and he put his tie on. "So Mr. Wilde, it's good to see that that costume actually worked as promised."

"Why me?" was all Nick could ask. "Why did you give me the suit?"

"When we found out about the suit from the alien, we first thought that Degato could wear it. After all, lions are considered somewhat regal, but we knew that with Mayor Lionheart being impeached it would look almost as if the lions were only trying to save one of their own," the agent answered. "Then we considered Wolford, playing off the old comic book series Super Wolf, but we wanted a predator without a pack or herd mentality. Besides the alien took a liking to Wolford, it seems she's partial to wolves and may have been in her biological version of…well, she was in heat and we kind of traded the poor boy to her for the suit."

"I don't understand, why a fox?" Nick replied. "We foxes aren't exactly held in high esteem."

"Exactly why we picked you," Jack continued with a smile as he lifted up his suit jacket. "Foxes are considered the most devious and cunning of all the predators, but you are also loners who don't form packs while still maintaining that canid trait of great loyalty to your friends. Add in the still well-known tales of a heroic fox named Robin Hood, an anti-hero who fought the establishment for the common mammal, both prey and predator."

"But why me and not some other red fox?" Nick pressed the hare, who was rummaging around for his belt.

"Simple Mister Nick Wilde, we've been watching you," the hare replied. "We saw how you've interacted with not only your friends, but others in the community. How you are slow to anger and although sarcastic sometimes, your are still respectful of others no matter what species." With a smile the agent pulled on his belt and walked over to a small safe, he pulled out a cord from the belt buckle and plugged it into the lock's electronic pad. There was a click and he opened the safe, removing a small hand gun and harness from inside.

Nick stood there with a perplexed look on his face as he watched the agent pull on his gun harness and then his jacket, the hare was a quite dashing looking figure now that he was dressed. Jack looked over at the fox and added, "Besides, Nick you're related to Robin Hood on your mother's side. We are counting that when it gets out that Robin Hood's great, great…well his great grandson generations removed is leading a revolt and that it will give not only your fellow predators, but also those prey mammals who feel helpless, enough hope to support our little rebellion."

* * *

 **Next Week: Run rabbit run! Our heroes attempt to escape.**

 **Author's Note: Yeah, I had to work Jake Runnel, an original character from one of my other series of stories into this story. In that series, Jake and Nick are best friends. So check out all six of the entertaining stories, starting with:  
**

 **Zootopia: A Raccoon's Redemption** \- The raccoon should not have punched the fox, but if he hadn't they would have never become friends. A story about a reformed crooked coon, a sly fox, and a cute bunny who are living in a big city. (Completed Rated M)


	10. Run Fox Run!

**Chapter 10: Run Fox, Run!**

* * *

 **Another "Fanfictional" Friday night and it is time once again for the next exciting chapter of** _ **The Greatest Zootopian Hero**_ **, as our** _ **I Love the 80's Series**_ **continues.**

 **This story is parody of** _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ **which was canceled by ABC before the last four produced episodes were aired. These so called "lost episodes" were later added to the series DVD collection when it went on the market. There was also a pilot made for a spin off called "** _ **The Greatest American Heroine**_ **" and rumors circulated in 2002 that Disney was considering making a movie. (You can use this for the script if you want to make a Zootopian movie version of the show…call me Mickey!). 20th TV, the current owners of the rights to the original series, previously attempted to twice reboot** _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ **. Finally ABC announced in late January that they have ordered a pilot to be made of the show, with a "female twist" in that a character named Meera, who is a tequila drinking and karaoke loving Indian-American woman is seeking her "purpose in life", gets the costume.**

 **So grab a paw full of** **Reese's Pieces** **, made popular by the 1982 classic movie** _ **E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial**_ **, and sit down to read tonight's exciting chapter!**

* * *

"I'm related to Robin Hood…the Robin Hood!" Nick Wilde exclaimed.

Agent Jack Savage stopped from adjusting his cuffs and looked over at the fox. "On your mother's side you are and right now our associates are on social media spreading the news even as we speak, of course we aren't mentioning the super suit."

A smirk came to the fox's muzzle and he laughed, "So does make you one of my Merry Mammals, you know like old Robin had?"

"Stuff it Wilde," Fangmeyer answered. "Jack we need to get moving, what is this plan of yours?"

"Take the back entrance to the first floor and load everyone into the armored trucks, then we shoot our way out of here," the hare shrugged. "It's really as simple as that."

"Then where do we go?" Judy asked. The police officer was still in her dirty civilian cloths and had returned after she had taken the wallaby's utility belt and boomerangs. Nick couldn't help but smile at the determination she was showing, to him it made her somehow more endearingly cute.

"The Nocturnal District," Jack answered. "The city has never really had control of that area, because it always has been a bit more independent minded thanks to the bats. Right now the only places in the city not fully under the city's control are the Nocturnal District and parts of Tundratown."

Nick followed the hare and tiger through the laboratory and back into the room with the cages. "We need to block the doorway so they can't force their way into the room as we leave," Fangmeyer observed. Reaching down, he picked up the electric whip with its harness and pulled it on. The whip crackled with electricity as he snapped it and he nodded with approval. "I'll stay with the rearguard covering the retreat. Savage, you led the rest to the vehicles and I'll join you there later." Several wolves and coyotes, along with a black bear and a lion had picked up the guards weapons and joined the tiger by the barricaded door.

Agent Savage nodded to the tiger, he knew that their chances of making it out were slim once the rhinos and elephants on the other side put their shoulders to the door and the flimsy barricade. "Do your best Rick," he answered. Then looking across the room, he walked towards a cage that contained a beautiful arctic fox. The fox wasn't snarling or snapping like the other animals, but she sat there looking at the hare with her head cocked to one side in a canid questioning way as the agent walked up to the bars. "I sorry Skye," he said to her. "I can't take you with us, but I swear I will find a cure and make Ramsey pay for this!" Surprisingly the fox jumped up on the bars and licked the hare's paws. The agent reached into the cage and ran his paw along her cheek before turning to face the others, there were tears in his eyes. "Let's go!" he snapped, while wiping his eyes with his jacket sleeve.

"Nick!" Judy called. "Do you think you can do something to reinforce the barricade? What about the steel bars from the empty cages?"

"I can try," he replied and then after walking up to one of the cages, he stared at the bars with determination as he tried to summon his heat vision.

"Hopps!" a voice bellowed out from the other cage. Judy turned to see Francine was awake and standing. "I'll hunt you down and stomp…." The rogue police officer never finished her threat when she saw Nick's glowing red eyes turn towards her.

Nick looked back at the empty cage and concentrated on the metal bars, his eye beams slashed out and cut through their tops and bottoms. Then closing his eyes, he blinked as his eye sight returned to normal. After pulling the metal bars off, he began twisting them together and then slammed his creation into the tile floor near the entry as he spread their tops apart so they pressed against the heavy door. "That should do it, no rhino is going to bust through the door now," he said with a smile.

"Okay everyone let's get going," Savage ordered. "Wilde you and I are in the front, we need to clear a path for the rest. Fangmeyer, your team is the rearguard, everyone else follow Hopps and do what she says."

They followed each other across the room with Jack and Nick in front of them. The agent had drawn this pistol and after fumbling around with his other paw, he found and pressed a hidden button which opened a door within the wall. "They'll know we're coming," Jack said as he slipped inside the opening and looked around. There was a flight of stairs leading downward, but no one was guarding the steps. Slowly and carefully, the group filed down the stairs until they came to another doorway. "It's up to you now fox."

Throwing the door open, the costumed fox charged into the large cavernous room and was greeted by a hail of bullets. He ran towards the guards, who looked surprised because he was already amongst them before they could reload. A rhino fell to one of his punches as another was tossed aside by his push. Nick turned to see a ram aiming his rifle at point blank range, but a grey blurry weapon hit the guard in the head and he crumpled to the ground. It took the fox a moment to realize that it was one of the boomerangs which Judy had taken from the wallaby. He turned to look in her direction and she was smiling at him before she charged towards another ram.

Their assault overwhelmed the defending guards, who were swiftly dispatched or disarmed, and Agent Savage quickly ordered everyone into the two largest armored vehicles as he and Judy got into a smaller armored car. "Nick, take point!" he yelled toward the fox, but as they opened the asylum's doors, they saw that the ZPD had blockaded the other end of the bridge with a massive armored SWAT van.

"Trapped!" Judy snapped as she looked at the group of police officers at the other end of the bridge. "Now what do we do?"

There was the squealing of tires and a crash as another armored SWAT van ran into the one that was blocking the bridge and with smoking tires, it shoved it off the bridge and into the swirling waters below. The sound of tasers and gunfire came from the other end of the bridge as police officer turned on officer. "Get moving Savage!" a uniformed muscular cape buffalo bellowed from the other end of the bridge.

"Was that Chief Bogo?" Judy asked in surprise as Nick jumped onto their armored car as it raced across the bridge towards the chaos.

Agent Savage had opened the vehicle's top hatch and begun to fire at the police officers with black bands on their uniforms, causing them to take shelter in the woods. Several police cars pulled ahead of the speeding convoy, along with the damaged SWAT truck, as they sped down the highway.

"Hey Carrots!" Nick shouted to the rabbit behind the wheel. "Don't forget the rental and you know who!"

"Weslengiton," Judy groaned. "We need to stop for him."

"His name is Weaselton," the fox corrected her with a smile on his muzzle. "Like it or not, he's one of us."

"We don't have time to stop, they'll be waiting for us down the road!" Jack yelled down at her. "Keep going, we've got to make it to the Nocturnal District!"

"I'm not leaving anyone behind!" Nick snapped as he jumped from the armored car and wobbly flew into the sky.

"He's getting better with the flying," Judy observed to the surprised looking hare as he ducked back into the vehicle.

She switched on the police radio and listened to the officers calling into the station for instructions. A familiar voice came over the air. "Dispatch to all units, proceed to Tundratown for a code 10-93, repeat all units to Tundratown code 10-93! 10-80 in progress, towards Tundratown."

"That's Clawhawser on the radio!" Judy exclaimed. "He's sending them the wrong direction."

* * *

Nick landed on his tailbone with a grunt next to the rental car where Duke Weaselton was sitting up and looking at the fox in surprise. "You can fly!" he exclaimed.

"Yep and we need to fly out of here before the cops arrive," Nick replied as he untied the weasel. "Now get on my back and let's go!"

"I'm not flying anywhere with you Wilde, you'll drop me," Duke complained as he clambered into the front seat and reached under the steering wheel, after a few attempts, the red sports car started. "I'll take my chances on the streets."

Nick watched the red sports car as it roared down the road and towards the highway. "Good luck Duke," he sighed before taking three steps and then he promptly soared through the air before hitting a tree. "That was embarrassing!" he snapped as he dropped back onto the ground. After wiping himself off, he tried again and this time he missed the trees as he wobbly soared into the darkening sky.

* * *

 **Next Week: The rebels gather their forces.**

 **(Writer's Update 3/31/2019: Got this one wrong! A big thank you to seakard for catching my error by saying it was Skittles, instead of Reese's Pieces, in the movie ET. Wrong product placement!)**


	11. The Gathering

**Chapter 11: The Gathering**

* * *

 **It's another I Love the 80's Flashback Friday and for those of us in the good old US of A, its National Puppy Day! In this chapter we continue to follow our large puppy in the red super costume during his adventure (yeah foxes have kits or** **cubs or pups or whelps…I'm confused!).**

 **Did you know that Ralph wasn't the only superhero to be on The Greatest American Hero? In Episode 7 of Season 1 called** _ **"My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys",**_ **Ralph is thinking about putting away the suit after causing a near tragedy. Then he meets John Hart who played the legendary the** _ **Lone Ranger**_ **on television in 52 episodes** **and the actor** **gives him some sage advice including, "** _ **But like it or not, our society needs its heroes."**_ **Maybe Nick Wilde needs to take that advice too!**

 **So while I'm digging through my closet looking for my VHS tape of the mediocre, but** **Razzie Award winning** **1981 remake of the Lone Ranger called the** _ **The Legend of the Lone Ranger,**_ **please enjoy this chapter.**

* * *

They drove into the darkness of the underground tunnel that led into the extensive network of caverns that ran beneath the mountains to the northwest of the city. This was one of the many entryways into the Nocturnal Darkness, a part of the city that never saw the brightness of the sun. The mammals who lived here preferred the darkness and only came out into the upper city during the night.

"Bats!" Officer Judy Hopps sighed as she drove the armored car deeper into the darkness, following the police cruiser that was in front of them.

"Bats?" Agent Jack Savage asked, "What do you mean by bats?"

"I've only met two bats in my whole life," the officer answered. "We rabbits may burrow underground, but we really don't like the darkness. We're mostly night blind, unlike many of our predator friends behind us, so this place makes me nervous."

"Most prey animals are somewhat night blind," Jack replied. "That's why the cops now stay out of here, not that the ZPD spent much time down here in the old days. The Confederation of Bats really runs this part of the city, despite what city hall claims."

"What about Tundratown?' the rabbit asked the tall thin handsome hare. "Why are parts of T-Town not under the city's control?"

"A lot of the arctic mammals are carnivores, especially the bears," Jack answered as he peeked out of the hatch. "We have allies over there and the prey animals who live in that part of the city were never big fans of the downtown bureaucrats."

"Allies?" the cop asked. "You mean like the mysterious Mister Big and his gang?"

"Exactly, Officer Hopps," the hare chuckled. "But Big isn't as ruthless as his reputation makes him out as being, he actually really cares about the mammals living on the cold side of the wall."

They pulled into a large cavern and the vehicles came to a halt, there were faint lights along the cave's walls. "I guess we are here," Agent Savage mused as he climbed out of the hatch and looked at the assorted mammals which had gathered awaiting them.

* * *

As Nick soared through the dark sky above the city, he looked down at the bright lights below. The city from the air at night looked so peaceful and pretty with its multicolored lights and lit up skyscrapers that rose tall above the streets. He realized that from above there were no indications of the dark troubles that were brewing below. The fox also found that he enjoyed flying, it was a dream of many mammals to soar freely above in the air like a bird or a plane and he was achieving that dream. Suddenly he heard the flapping of wings to his left and looked over to see that two small brown colored bats had flown over to him. "Hey Larry, when they said to look for a flying fox, I thought they meant one of our cousins from Outback Island and not a real fox flying!" one of the long eared bats called over to the other.

"Are you Nick!" the bat named Larry asked as he zoomed in closer. "The boss said for you to follow us back to the caverns. He said that you weren't supposed to be alone though, where's the weasel?"

"He decided not to come," Nick replied and then he wobbled and dropped as he lost his train of thought.

"I can understand," the bat laughed. "You just about fell out of the sky yourself, what's holding you up? You've got not wings, is there a jet pack under that cape?"

"Nope, it's just me walking on air!" Nick laughed. "But watch out when I land, I'm still working on that!" He followed the bats across the dark sky and towards a hole in the side of a mountain and true to his inexperience, he flew muzzle first into the ground at the opening.

One of the bats landed next to him. "You weren't kidding about your landings, why don't you walk down from here on?"

* * *

"Where is Chief Bogo!" the small ewe with the puffy white wool hair bun in the sky blue blouse and black slacks yelled as she slammed her hoof down on the massive desk she was sitting behind. It made the desk plate that said Mayor Leodore Lionheart bounce slightly. Her oversized chair had been jacked up to its full height and she was still shorter than the hippo in the police uniform that was standing on the other side of the desk.

"He's…he's gone over to the rebels," Corporal Higgins replied. "He turned on us, along with several other officers and we lost them during the chase to Tundratown."

Dawn Bellwether had once appeared as a meek, shy, and overworked, assistant to Mayor Lionheart, but this was a ruse as the ewe had spent years ruthlessly working with her allies to achieve this coup of the city's power. "Bogo was an important part of our plan, he represented the continuity and support of the police between our administrations once we ousted Lionheart out!"

"Do we have any idea where he went?" a well-dressed camel in a tan suit, white dress shirt, and blue tie asked the police officer. His hoofs played with the red fez he had removed from his forehead.

"We think they went into Tundratown," the hippo replied.

"If he's with Big and his gang it will take an army to root him out of there," Bellwether sighed. "We don't have the mammalpower to do that or the firepower."

"We do have the formula," the fat hornless ram spoke up. "I've perfected the formula into a pellet form and we can use it on the polar bears to cause chaos."

"Ramsey is right, chaos is good mates!" a kangaroo in a sport shirt and khaki slacks spoke up. "It'll drive more public opinion to our efforts and we can push through the new laws."

"But we can't let things get too chaotic," the ewe sighed. "If we lose control, they'll turn on us."

* * *

The cavern was huge with icicle shaped stalactites hanging from the ceiling of the cave, dripping their mineral laden wetness on to the stalagmites below. Inside of a mammal made larger room was gathered some of the city's greatest minds, both predator and prey. Nick felt like a lab specimen as they poked and prodded him while making him undergo extensive testing of both his strength and invulnerability with the high tech equipment that also filled the room. Finally Doctor Honey Badger announced to him the suit worked by not by enhancing his natural talents, but by augmented his will through the use of biomechanical tactical telekinesis.

"Bio tactical teley what a hooey?" the fox asked in a perplexed voice to the amusement of everyone in the room.

"Biomechanical tactical telekinesis," the doctor chuckled. "In other word the suit is designed to use the wearer's will to accomplish what he or she wants done. A type of force field is generated by the suit around your body and it protects you, gives you your strength, and flying abilities. We're not sure why you have both X-ray and heat vision, but these too may be a manifestation of the suit doing your will."

"They were powers that Super Wolf had in the comic books," Nick replied. "So maybe the suit is mimicking his powers when I want them."

"What about his super speed?" Agent Savage asked. "He was moving faster than any fox should be able to when he was inside the asylum."

"I didn't even know I was doing that, I just wanted to get at the guards as fast as I could to protect everyone," Nick answered. "I guess the suit responded by giving me speed."

"So just how powerful is he?" Savage continued.

"We don't know," the doctor shrugged. "There is only so much testing we can do in this facility."

"Weaknesses?" the agent asked.

"While he is wearing the suit, probably none from physical threats or abilities," the doctor replied as she moved to look at the fox's x-ray. "Without the suit, he's just as vulnerable as anyone else."

Office Judy Hopps entered the room and behind her stood a very muscular uniformed cape buffalo who stared at the fox with his arms crossed. "So this is the fox," he grumbled. "He doesn't look so tough in that silly outfit."

"This fox in his silly outfit could toss all two thousand pounds of you around the room like a paper doll," Savage replied. "What do we know about the serum they are using to make mammals go feral?"

"We need samples of the serum," Judy grimly replied. "Thanks to Doctor Honey Badger we do know that Doug Ramsey is somehow formulating the serum from the bulbs of Midnicampum holicithias. Our medical team hasn't a clue how to cure the infected or make an antidote."

"So we need to find this Doug Ramsey and sneak into his lab for a sample," Nick mused. "I wonder?"

Everyone looked back at the costumed fox, but he wasn't there! "Slick, were did you go!" the rabbit yelled.

"Quit yelling, I'm right here Carrots," the fox laughed as he lifted the rabbit into the air. "I'm just invisible."

"You can become invisible?" Agent Savage asked as he watched the rabbit floating through the air and then she too just disappeared. "What happened to Officer Hopps?"

"I just covered her with my cape," the fox laughed. The rabbit reappeared and then disappeared. "Now you see her, now you don't!"

"Incredible!" Chief Bogo snorted as he looked around in wonder.

"Not incredible," Nick said as he landed and reappeared. "Just the imagination of a sneaky sly fox."

* * *

 **Author's Note: Yep, I borrowed the idea of tactical telekinesis from one of my son's old Superboy comics where the character of Kon-El was a cloned version of Superman.**


	12. Scents & Scentless

**Chapter 12: Scents & Scentless**

* * *

 **You've made it through another week and this next chapter is your** _ **I Love the 80's Flashback Friday's**_ **treat! This week we have little less action and more of a personal story as Nick reconnects with his friend Finnick.**

 **Actor William Katt along with Christopher Folino, Sean O'Reilly and Derek McCaw wrote a comic book version of** _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ _ **,**_ **which was** **published by Katt's own Catastrophic Comics. Three issues were produced of the planned series of six and the third issue shows our hero standing next to President Obama.**

 **Now I would dig into my pile of comics to find these issues, but they're in the box with my** **Teddy Ruxpin, the hottest selling toy in 1985. You put the special cassette tape into its back and the bear's mouth and eyes move as it "talks"…creepy! It kind of reminds me of a fluffy sneaky version of Chucky from Child's Play.**

* * *

The invisible fox sat the bunny down and slowly crept across the laboratory floor toward the hare, who appeared not to know that he was coming. He suppressed a chuckle as he got ready to leap and scare the agent, but suddenly Savage's ears flicked as he swiftly drew his pistol and aimed it right at the end of the fox's nose.

"You can see me?" Nick asked in surprise as he returned to normal.

"No Wilde," the agent sighed and as he pointed towards his ears. "I heard you! Let's hope the ram's ears are not as good."

"It's these coverings over my foot paws," the fox grumbled. "Who covers their foot paws?"

"Gazelle does," Judy replied with a smile. "Oh and I wrap my paws when I'm in uniform."

"Yeah, but these things make my paws sweat!" the fox continued to complain.

"Wilde, concentrate!" Savage snapped. "Our intelligence tells us that Doug Ramsey has moved his lab into the downtown police station."

"What about the infected mammals they left behind at the asylum, what did they do with them?" Judy asked. She looked over at the hare who didn't show any emotion when she asked the question.

"They're still there," he muttered. "As far as we can tell, they've abandoned them in their cages."

"We've got to somehow rescue them," the rabbit replied. "We can't leave them behind to starve."

"We don't have the resources to save them Hopps," Chief Bogo added. "We would have to move them in their cages and that would take both the time and equipment we don't have."

Nick slipped away from the others as they continued to discuss the infected mammals and poked around the nearby larger cavern until he found who he was looking for, a very dejected looking fennec fox. Finn was sitting on a large grey stone, his ears were droopy and he was still in his dirty torn black bowling shirt. "So you lost your van?" Nick asked as he sat next to Finn. "I so sorry that happened."

The smaller fox shrugged and looked up at his larger friend. "Look Nick…" he started to answer, but then he looked back down again at his foot paws. "I panicked Nick, back in the Canyonlands…I just panicked."

Nick looked down at Finn, the smaller fox was clenching his paws into fists and so he reached down and put his much larger paw on his friend's back. "Look Finn, it's okay," Nick sighed. "If I could have run, I'd done so myself!"

"It was that cop, the fire, Weaselton's screaming, the spacecraft…you know?" he muttered.

"Weaselton's screaming?" Nick laughed.

"Yeah loud and shrill," Finn laughed back.

"Again, I'm sorry about the van," Nick chuckled.

"Thanks, but those Bozo's in there do owe me a new van," Finn replied with a grin. "I lost everything with her, she was my home too!"

"Well that might explain the stench," Nick said in a playful manner. "You smell like fox musk…OLD fox musk!"

"Stuff in Wilde!" the smaller fox laughed. "I'd shove my fist down that big fat muzzle of yours if it wasn't invulnerable. Why ain't you hot in that costume?"

"I was at first, but for some reason I'm not now," Nick answered as he reached down and pulled on the foot paw coverings. "Having my paws covered like this still bugs me though."

"There's another weird thing about you Nick," Finn continued as he sniffed the air around them. "After all that running around and punching bad guys, you should smell like sweat but you don't."

"Gee thanks!" Nick sarcastically chuckled.

"No Nick, I mean you don't smell at all," Finn said as he shook his head. "I mean you've got no scent at all…zippo…nada, not even the normal fox musk."

"Really, no one has said anything about that before," Nick shrugged. "I can smell everyone else and thank goodness I don't have a super sniffer because some of you stink." Just then he looked over and saw Judy had entered the room. She had changed out of her dirty civilian clothes and appeared to have showered. She was now wearing some slightly oversized dark blue police fatigues like the SWAT officers wore and a high impact armored vest with POLICE printed on the back. There were red bands on each of her arms. He looked over at the other officers and they had the same color bands.

"Red as in red fox," Finn quipped, answering Nick's unspoken question. "Look at the back of some of the larger cops, they have painted a stylized fox face on their vests too."

"What have I gotten myself into," the larger fox moaned. "I don't want to be a hero!"

"Well you are," Finn replied. "I've even heard some of them saying your Robin Hood returned from the grave. Most are saying your related to the guy and are here to led us into a better future where everyone gets along together and will sing kum ba yah or some kind of crap. So put your hustler's hat on Red, I've seen you use that silver tongue of yours to talk plenty of marks out of their cash and it's time to pull the greatest hustle of your life, which is making everyone think you're a hero and inspire us to take our city back."

Nick looked down at him and Finn could see the panic in his eyes. "Look Nick, just be yourself…well don't be yourself…no what I mean is you have the ability to inspire others, hell you can spin a great yarn or two. So be honest with them and don't let any of this get to your head. "

"I wonder what my ancestor Robin Hood would have done in a situation like this?" he began to ask, but he looked over and watched as Judy began walking towards him. He stood up with concern because she was shaking and didn't look very well.

Finn smiled as he saw his friend's tail began wagging, but then he caught the rabbit's scent and she smelled like there was booze in her sweat. "She got the DT's Nick," he softly said to the larger fox. "She must be a heavy drinker and has quit the bottle recently."

Nick pulled his cape off and wrapped it around the now sickly bunny. "Are you cold," he asked. "You're shaking."

"Thanks, I'll get over it soon I hope," she muttered as she pulled it tighter.

Finn's eyes widened as the cape seemed to cling to her as if it was alive and then even expand a little to cover her completely. Suddenly he realized as it engulfed her, that the boozy sweat smell was gone and she had stopped shaking. In fact, she was looking much better and then he smelled a very feminine rabbit scent.

"Better?" Nick asked as he put his arms around her as he pulled her closer and she nodded. Without even realizing it, his tail had wrapped itself around her legs.

"You two need a room?" Finn snickered. "Everyone is watching."

Both the rabbit and fox jumped and separated. "Well partner, let's see what the brains in charge of this operation have up their sleeves for us to do next?" he announced a little too loudly.

Finn gave a deep laugh as this friend and the cop bunny walked together towards the exit. He had known Nick since they were teenagers and the taller fox had dated plenty of vixens, but he was never was serious with any of them. The smaller fox could tell that his friend was very interested in the bunny cop and her scent told him she felt the same for the fox. "UFOs…super suits…why not a rabbit and a fox?" he chuckled to himself. "These are strange times, indeed."

* * *

 **Next week: Our heroes plot how to break into jail?**


	13. The Purge

**Chapter 13: The Purge**

* * *

 **Our fantastic Flashback Friday train keeps chugging on…TOOT! TOOT! Tonight our story leads our heroes into the enemy's den.**

 **So in a fair fight, who would win? In** _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ **the suit gave Ralph superpowers ranging from** **flight,** **super** **strength, invulnerability, invisibility, precognition, E.S.P., telekinesis, X-ray vision,** **super** **speed, pyrokinesis, holographic vision, shrinking, psychometry, and even the ability to detect the supernatural. On the other paw, in** _ **The Greatest Zootopian Hero**_ **the suit has so far given Nick flight, super strength, invulnerability, invisibility, X-ray vision, super speed, heat vision, self-cleaning, and the ability not to stink.**

 **I saw on MSN last week that the hottest toy of 1981 was a doll names Strawberry Shortcake which looks like scented version of a raggedy Ann doll. But instead of going to Strawberryland, where her cat Custard hang outs with Escargot the Snail, let's just read tonight's exciting chapter!**

* * *

 _"No Nick!" the rabbit in the black cape pleaded as the growling fox crept closer to her, she flinched back against the wall as his drooling jaws drew closer. Their plan had gone terribly wrong..._

It all started hours ago, when the rebellion's leadership was telling Judy and Nick of their plan for a series of attacks against the government forces. It was in her estimation that the plan was too elaborate for the small force that they could possibly muster, but both Agent Savage and Chief Bogo were confident it would work. Fangmeyer would lead a team of the rebels against the government troops blockading Tundratown in conjunction with an assault from within the town. At the same time, another team would sneak into the downtown police station and secure the formula for Doug Ramsey's toxin from a double agent. The problem was that no one expected the level of viciousness that Bellwether and her allies would actually go to in order to seize and retain power.

A news announcement was broadcasted that predator "terrorists" had seized and shut down the environmental control turbines inside the city's Great Wall, they had turned off the ones that cooled Tundratown. Griping Nick's arm, Judy watched the television as the now self-proclaimed "Mayor Bellwether" declared martial law. "We will restore law and order!" she proclaimed and then announced that all predators would be "temporarily" detained in the city's largest sports stadium until a solution could be found to control them from reverting back to savages.

"It's a purge!" she heard Savage tell Chief Bogo.

The station switched to a live report of fighting between militia and a tribe of coyotes in the Canyonlands. Photos of burning mobile homes and a large adobe brick building were shown. In front of the fires, lay the inert bodies of several of the canines but then the report abruptly ended as photos of the City Hall were shown and stirring patriotic music began to play.

"They have seized total control," the uniformed cape buffalo grumbled. "We have to respond."

"That's what they are hoping we will do," Savage replied as he shook his head. "It's a trap."

"But if we don't get those generators back online, as the snow and ice melts it will flood Tundratown," Doctor Honey Badger pointed out.

The ground shook and there was a series of rumbles, which caused some of the stalactites to fall from the cavern ceiling and sent the some of the bats twittering about in panic. Fortunately no one was hurt by the falling rocks, at least within the caverns they occupied, but the sounds of sirens echoed as ambulances responded to areas that were more damaged.

Jake Runnel entered the room and he looked around with wild eyes. Around his neck was a white bandage, which covered the burnt and raw wounds he had suffered while tortured by the shock collar and Judy thought it almost made the raccoon look like a priest, but Runnel's cursing proved he was far from being a holy mammal. "They've blown some of the tunnels leading into the caverns," he announced. "I think they are planning on sealing us inside of here. Some of our aerial scouts also report that there are fires in Hyenahurst and they seem to be out of control, there just aren't enough personnel left in the fire department to stop the flames. The gods know that they were already badly understaffed even before city hall made them fire the predator officers."

Judy hung her head and the fox heard her mumble, "Wolford said for me to help Nick save the city…but how?"

Agent Savage began to pace and talk to himself, "If we send a team to seize the turbines back, they will destroy them and blame us for the act. Do we have any idea how long it will be before it gets hot enough to start melting the ice and snow in any significant amounts?"

"Two or three days, maybe?" Doctor Honey Badger answered his question.

"Then we have some time before that reaches a crisis level," the thin hare said as he looked at the city map. "We can't help Hyenahurst either."

"We've got to do something," Chief Bogo complained. "We just can't hide in here and let them drop the mountains down on top of us."

"Then our best bet is to find proof that they're using the toxin to create the crises and discredit them," Savage replied. "That means infiltrating the downtown police station and recovering either samples of the toxin or the formula as we discussed. The fox can turn invisible and he has proven that he can hide someone inside his cape. It will have to be someone who knows his way around that building."

"How about Runnel," Bogo suggested. "He keeps escaping the holding cells and wandering the hallways."

"I told you I only did that once because I wanted a cup of coffee," the raccoon sighed. "Besides, I'm a lover and not a fighter. So this coon says no way!"

"I can do it Chief!" Judy spoke up. "I know the station and I can fight."

"You're only a meter maid," the bull snapped. "Not a cop!"

"Oh, she can fight!" Nick added. "She fought at the asylum and beat the snot out of that wallaby. So she's the one who's going!"

Bogo looked down and started objecting, but the fox cut him off, "It's my cape and my rules!"

* * *

They left out of the same hidden opening that the bats had shown Nick when he arrived. Carefully, he cradled Judy in his arms as they left the ground and soared into the night sky. The city below them had drastically changed since he had flown from the asylum to the mountains, below them blue and red lights were flashing along the darkened streets and they could see fires raging in the distance where Hyenahurst and parts of Tundratown burned. The tunnels into the Nocturnal District were smoking from the explosions that had collapsed the entryways into the mountains in an attempt to seal its residents underground. Police blimps droned along the sky, sweeping their spotlights across the buildings below and the fox had to change his course several times to avoid them. He had quickly found out that the strain from both flying and trying to stay invisible was more then he could handle at once, so he concentrated on flying only. A few times he was distracted while watching the horror below and began to wobble or fall.

"Sweet cheese and crackers," Judy snapped as she looked down at the chaos below where armed police and untrained militia patrolled the streets of the heaviest predator populated areas of the town. Behind them rumbled a fleet of all kinds of buses, ranging from city transit, school, and even commandeered church buses. Once filled with their unlucky occupants, they drove their loads towards the city's massive sports arena. Her ears wilted as she saw the bodies left behind of both predator and prey, victims of the night's insanity.

"They're shooting anyone who resists," Nick grimly growled. "Not even trying to arrest them!"

Sudden gunfire drew their attention as a panicked young bear cub frantically started running, only to be shot in her back. Then they saw the two laughing rams turn their guns on the cub's friend an elephant calf who tried to help her. She could feel the fox tense up and heard him growl as they began to descend. "No Nick, the mission!" she whispered as she reached up and touched his cheek. "We've got to complete our mission, it's too late to help them."

Flashing red eyes met hers and then slowly they returned to emerald green, she saw the pained expression he gave her as they returned to their flight path, but he had sped up. His landing sent them both sprawling on top of a building across from the police station. He stood and looked up at the stars for a few moments, wiping tears from his eyes before walking towards the building's edge. She watched as he concentrated while staring at the station. "My x-ray vision shows there's a lab inside, I think it's set up in the morgue of all places," he finally said in a soft but menacing voice that caused her ears to droop.

"It's probably in the forensic lab," Judy softly replied. "So I guess we will have to walk from here, do you think you can keep us cloaked and invisible for that long."

He looked down at the mass of militia which were gathered and being issued weapons, most of whom only had a vague inkling of how to handle their gun. "I'd like to tear my way through them all and show them what a true predator can do!" he softly growled.

She looked back at him with concern and saw that he unclenched his fists and hung his head with a sigh. "But vengeance isn't justice and I have a feeling most of those guys down there are only here because they really believe that we preds have gone savage. No, they're being played as saps. Hell, most of them don't even know how to load a gun."

She nodded and then slightly jumped as his arms enfolded her. "Why aren't you scared of me?" he asked in a sad venerable manner. "Why aren't you afraid that I might go savage… I might try to EAT you?"

She looked up into his emerald eyes and reached out with her paw to touch his muzzle, so close to those sharp teeth. "No I'm not," she replied. His ears flicked in surprise as she stroked his fur. "You've got a good heart somewhere under all that red fur."

"Carrots, You left your fox repellent back in the cave," he observed with a small smile.

"I brought a gun instead," she whispered. "Not that I want to use it."

"Ready partner," he whispered back.

"Yeah, let's make the world a better place," she replied as he tightened his cape around her before they disappeared from sight.

* * *

 **Next week: Clawhauser is back & I see spots!**


	14. I See Spots!

**Chapter 14: I See Spots!**

* * *

 **I love Friday's because it's time for another chapter of our story and tonight in _The Greatest Zootopian Hero_ , Benjamin Clawhauser returns in all his glory! **

**Ralph's lawyer and girlfriend Pam Davidson is played by veteran actress Connie Sellecca, but did you know that** _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ **wasn't her first superhero show? In 1979 she played Dr. Wendy Day in the made for television movie** _ **Captain America II: Death Too Soon**_ **. Thank goodness we all tried to forget about that movie and the first one too!**

 **Now somewhere in my boxes from the 1980's I may have my old Mego super hero flying Captain America figure, who knew that the guy could fly? While I'm digging through the attic, enjoy tonight's action packed chapter.**

* * *

"Yeah, let's make the world a better place," she whispered to him and he could not help but give her an affectionate little squeeze causing her to give a cute squeak.

"Sorry, I'm a little excited," he softly snickered as they sneaked down the stairwell to the lobby of the building. In front of them was an army of untrained and ill-disciplined animals milling around awaiting orders. Holding her tightly against him, he invisibly slipped out of the door and began to weave in and out of the group. He bit his tongue as hear snippets of their conversations, but they both remained silent as they crept towards the door.

" _So I heard that the preds in Tundratown have gone savage and those polar bears are roaming the streets eating everyone…"_

" _I don't want to shoot anyone, one of my college friends is a wolf!_

" _Just dump 'em and shot 'em all mate! Those dingos had the best on the island and it's ours now…"_

" _I heard that they are being led by Robin Hood, he's come back from the dead…"_

" _We've got to get them all safely locked up until we figure this out!"_

He could smell their fear, they were afraid and not thinking this through. What freedoms were they willing to give up in the name of security? The door to the police station opened and he and Judy quickly rushed to get inside before it closed. "The morgue is down this way," Judy whispered as she pulled him down a hallway.

"Slow down," he whispered back and yanked her towards the wall just as a muscular bull walked out of a door and stepped on his tail.

"What the heck?" the bull snorted as he looked at his hoof. "That was weird!" Nick moved his tail as the bull stomped down again and then shrugged before moving on down the hallway.

"It's in here!" she whispered, but he cut her off from opening the door and looking inside of the room.

"There's someone in there!" he softly hissed. "I can't look inside without losing our invisibility so let me peek first." Slowly he turned the knob and cracked the door open, then after sticking his head inside he quickly closed it again.

"What's the problem," she asked.

"There's…there's a cheetah in there!" he whispered. "A big fat and very naked cheetah."

"That must be Benny!" she groaned. "They must have gotten him, what is he doing?

Nick cracked to door open and peeked again. "Gross!" he replied in a whisper. "You don't want to see this."

She pushed under his arm and looked. "Sweet Cheese and Crackers!" she mumbled a little too loud when she saw that the big cat was tongue bathing himself…all of himself.

The cat's ears twitched and he stopped licking himself and lazily looked around before prowling on all four paws, with his belly swaying, towards the door with a primal but curious look.

Closing the door Nick sighed. "If we move really, really slow we might sneak by him."

"What about our scent?" she quietly asked.

"Finn pointed out that the suit's is suppressing my scent, you didn't notice?" he replied. "You just need to remain calm."

"I hear better then I smell," the rabbit replied.

"You smell good to me!" he snickered softly to himself, but she heard him and blushed.

"Come on Slick, we have a mission to finish!" she snapped.

He opened the door and the two of them stepped into the room, pressing against the wall as Ben ambled over to the door and sniffed. The cheetah didn't see anything and plopped down and began to scratch his cheek with his rear paw. Slowly they began to move toward the door on the other room while keeping a wary eye on the big fat naked cat. He pulled her closer to his side and his paw accidentally slipped down to brush her soft fluffy tail, he quickly moved his paw away but it was too late. She didn't say anything, but her scent tantalizingly changed and across the room the big cat smelled it. He waddled across the room straight towards them sniffing as he came and then pounced.

"Ahhh!" Judy yelled as she was knocked from Nick's embrace and fell onto the floor. Nick moved to stop the cat's attack, but was surprised as the cheetah began rubbing and purring against his partner.

"I think he likes you fluff," the fox chuckled. His voice drew the attention of the fat feline who prowled towards him with a growl.

"No Ben!" Judy called out and ran to begin stroking between the big cat's ears. "He's a friend." The cat sat down and looked in curiosity as the costumed fox appeared.

"This guy is…err, was a cop?" Nick asked. "How'd he pass the fitness exam?"

"Ben has a glandular problem," Judy replied in a defensive tone. "Don't you sweetie." She stroked the big cat's ears and the fat cheetah began to purr.

"Carrots, he looks more like he has a doughnut problem," the fox snickered pointing to the chocolate glazed doughnut which was caught in one of the big cat's fat rolls around his neck.

Just then the door to the lab opened as a fat hornless ram in a white lab coat, along with a sturdy looking uniformed hippo and a small ewe in a blue suit and white blouse entered the room. "What is going on in here?" the hippo snapped and then seeing the fox and the rabbit, he shoved the other two out of the room. "Call for back up! I'll try to stop them." He drew an old fashioned tranquilizer gun and instead of firing at either the rabbit or fox he shot the cheetah.

Judy pulled at the dart as the big cat's eyes rolled up and he collapsed. "He shot Ben!" she yelled.

Nick charged forward, but the hippo only put his hoofs up in surrender. "Look fox, I'm on your side," Higgins whispered. "I work with Bogo and Savage." Nick stopped his punch just inches from the officer's big mouth and was surprised as the large mammal shoved a piece of paper into his paw.

"You're on our side?" Judy asked. "I thought you were Bellwether's guy?"

"I'm a double agent," the hippo replied. "Now we have to make it sound like we are fighting, so beat me up a little."

Nick grabbed his arm and threw him against the wall with a thud and then put his fist through the wall as the officer tore his uniform some and also pounded on the wall. He sat down on the ground and acted dazed, just a Bellwether and two large rams in combat fatigues came back into the room. The rams were trained killers and entered firing their rifles at the fox, Judy noticed that Higgins crawled his way out of the room and into the hallway.

"Get him!" the ewe screamed as she fumbled around trying to load a large pistol with something from a case. "Stop him!"

The rams lowered their heads and charged horns first at the fox, who snarled back.

Unbeknownst to everyone else once he left the room, the uniformed hippo stumbled to his feet and ran down the hallway towards the surveillance room where the security camera monitors were kept. As he entered the room, he began to switch on the cameras until he found the one that showed the room where the fox was battling the rams. He smiled as he turned on the auto and then reaching over, he pulled the wiring and plugged them into a device that Agent Savage had used to stealthily watch everything going on in the building. The images and auto from the camera began to broadcast to the rebels, he knew that the agent's team would soon hack the city's extensive communication network and broadcast the entire battle to every television, cell phone, and even radio.

Back in the room, the costume fox had made short work of the two beefy rams and turned to face the small sheep who instead of cowering in fear was smirking at him as she held a large pistol.

"This is the endgame fox," she laughed. "You've messed up all my plans, but now the city's newest hero is going to become its greatest villain."

"You're crazy," Judy protested. "You made all those poor animals go savage for what? Power?" Money? Your ego?

"Power?" Bellwether laughed. "Of course power, riches, control, I have it all now! For years everyone looked down at me because of my size. Having to go through life being called cute all the time and patronized, being the last one to be picked for the team on the playground because of your size! Left behind by your so called friends because you slowed them down! Pushed around and bullied by a wolf…why am I telling you this bunny? You should know what it's like being the so called little guy! Its time one of us little guys showed them what we can do and I have!"

"But using fear to turn everyone against each other, why would you do that?" the fox asked. "Others have died because of your scheme!"

"Stupid fox, no matter what you've been told prey always fears predator," she said and then laughed. "Don't you know your little partner over there really fears you deep down inside? Besides, you have to break a few eggs to make an omelet."

The fox gave a low growl and Bellwether only laughed in reply.


	15. Savage Heart

**Chapter 15: Savage Heart**

* * *

 **As we continue with our Flashback Friday story,** _ **The Greatest Zootopian Hero**_ **, we find our heroes having a somewhat familiar dialog with one of the villains and also the return of one pesky** **pachyderm.**

 **Although some folks might not agree with me, but** _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ **probably would not have made it to the small screen if it hadn't been for the 1978 movie** _ **Superman**_ **starring Christopher Reeves, Gene Hackman, and Margot Kidder.** _ **Superman II**_ **came out in 1980 and pitted the Man of Steel against his fellow Kryptonians when** **General Zod and his co-conspirators, Ursa and Non escaped from the Phantom Zone. Following the success of that movie, the franchise struggled with a series of mediocre sequels including** _ **Superman III**_ **which turned into a campy comedy that had Superman pitted against a bumbling genius played by Richard Pryor. Not happy with this almost failure, the studio attempted one more time in 1987 with** _ **Superman IV: The Quest for Peace**_ **and managed to finally achieve making one of the worst Superman movies ever made.**

 **Now while you are reading tonight's chapter of our story, I'm going to cook me up some Kellogg Pop Tarts. The TV ad in the 1980's went that they are** _ **"So hot they're cool, so cool they're hot!"**_ **Of course, Kellogg did get sued because their Pop Tarts did sometimes catch fire in the toaster...that's hot!  
**

* * *

"So that's it? Prey fears predator and you stay in power?" Police officer Judy Hopps asked the small sheep holding the large gun.

"Yeah, pretty much," Bellwether shrugged.

"It won't work!" Judy challenged her.

"Fear always works! And I'll dart every predator in Zootopia to keep it that way!" the ewe laughed as she fired at the costumed fox.

Judy turned to look as Nick first grunted and then growled as he dropped down into a heap on the floor. "No Nick!" the rabbit in the black cape pleaded as the growling fox first shook and then crept at her, she flinched as his drooling jaws drew closer. Their plan had gone terribly wrong. "Please no!" she protested again as she saw the fox look at her with his hungry savage eyes as he snarled.

The rabbit's ears flicked as she heard Bellwether's jubilant voice, "Bye, bye bunny!"

Closer and closer the growling fox stalked towards her and with her back against the wall, she had no place to run. He licked his chops and opened his mouth, she could see his sharp fangs as they inched closer to her neck. "No…no…please don't Nick," she whimpered. He didn't seem to understand her as he gave once last deep growl and then his jaws touched her cheek, but not in a deadly tearing bite, but in a soft kiss!

"It's called a hustle Sweetheart!" he laughed as he stood up and grinned at her. Judy looked at him in confusion and then she saw that Higgins had entered back into the room. "It's seems our pal over there was working undercover for Savage and broadcasted our whole conversation city wide using the station's security cameras, So now everyone knows your plot Bellwether. It's over for you and your cronies."

"I shot you!" the ewe stammered wide-eyed as she looked first at the gun and then the fox. "You should have gone savage!"

"You've really got to love being faster than a speeding bullet," Nick laughed as he gently held the little blue ball in his paw. "I caught it! Hey, you know this kind of looks like a little blueberry." He passed the ball to Judy who placed it into a pouch on her belt.

"I may have missed you once, but not twice!" the angry ewe snapped as she brought the gun up to take aim. Before she could pull the trigger, Nick's eyes blazed as his heat vision struck the gun, causing it to break. Bellweather desperately started wiping at the blue stain that appeared on her hoof. "No…No…NO!" she screamed before finally convulsing as she fell onto the floor with guttural baaah.

"Carrots, we foxes have a saying that Karma's a bitch," Nick smugly chuckled as he watched the panicked little sheep running around before him. "I guess we're right that she is, now let's get Ramsey." As he opened the door, there was a huge explosion and a fireball which threw the fox backwards.

"Ramsey's blown the lab!" Higgins cried out as the hippo grabbed Judy, carrying her away from the fire. "We need to leave before this place falls down."

"But Nick!" Judy yelled back as she tried to wiggle free of the other police officer's strong grasp.

"I'm fine Fluff!" she heard the fox call out from within the smoke and flames. "Get out now and I'll follow."

He caught up with them before they reached the front door with the unconscious and somewhat scorched sheep slung over his shoulder. They hastily threw the doors open, only to find they were facing a huge crowd of armed prey militia. "Get behind me," Nick commanded as he handed the ewe to the uniformed hippo. "This might get ugly."

"Shoot them!" someone yelled.

"Why?" someone yelled back. "It was all a lie, the preds aren't going savage are they?" Murmurs turned to yelling as the group argued with each other. As he watched the crowd , Nick didn't see the missile coming and it hit him squarely in his chest, blowing him backwards into the burning building.

"Die fox!" a huge elephant in black combat fatigues screamed as she tossed the empty cylinder away and picked up another anti-tank missile launcher.

"Don't Francine!" Judy called out. "They tried to trick you, it's all fake!"

"Trick me!" Pennington snorted. "I knew what they were doing the whole time you stupid bunny and when I finish with this chomper, you're next traitor." She lifted the missile launcher to her shoulder and aimed where the fox should have been, but he was gone!

"Are you looking for me?" a voice asked from above, she looked up and saw the reddish orange furred fox in the crimson costume hovering above them all like an avenging angel. Around her all eyes were looking skyward in awed wonder. "Look I don't know what happened to you to hate us predators like you do, but I don't want to fight you…any of you!" he shouted, his voice seemed unnaturally amplified. "This is all a set up … a hustle, they want you to fear and hate us so they can take power over this city. We preds don't want you to fear us, all we want is to be treated as equals and be accepted in this city we call our home. We're not your enemy, we are your neighbors."

He heard the sound of guns being dropped as several of the militia members tossed them away. Others were pulling the black bands from the sleeves.

"No!" the elephant yelled. "If I can't kill you, then I'll kill the traitor!" She swung the launcher around and fired at the little rabbit in the blue police fatigues and black cape.

Nick watched as the missile streaked towards its target and no matter how fast he tried to fly, he knew he was going to be too late. His eye's glowed red as he fired his heat vision, but the missile exploded in front of Judy. The fox slammed onto the ground and crawled toward the bundle before him, she should have been obliterated by the explosion, but he picked her up and she was covered by the black cape. "Judy!" he cried out as he lifted her into the air. "No…Judy don't die…I…I love you!"

A paw reached up from inside the cape and stroked his cheek. "I'm okay Slick," the bunny sighed. "I don't know how, but I'm alive." He gently hugged her in his arms and pulled back the cape so he could see her amethyst eyes. She smiled up at him and then their lips met in a deep passionate kiss.

"A fox in love with a rabbit?" someone below asked. "I thought they were moral enemies?"

"This is so wrong!" another voice called out. "We've been lied to!"

By now most of the crowd had lowered their guns, expect for a few police offers led by Office Higgins who were now aiming their guns at the elephant.

"Is it over?" the fox asked the rabbit snugged in his arms. "Did we win?"

"No Nick, Ramsey is still out there and so is a hardcore of his believers who still need to be captured," the rabbit sighed. "But we better get this sample back to the lab for the doctors to use to make an antidote."

"Maybe they might want the formula instead," Nick laughed as he looked down at the hippo. "Higgins gave it to me earlier."

"Get going!" Higgins yelled up to them. "I've got this under control."

He soared into the night sky with Judy holding tightly around his neck. "You're not wobbling anymore while you fly," she observed. "I guess you finally got the hang of things?"

"You might say I came to a realization back there," the fox replied with a grin. "A realization about a lot of things, like you and me for one."

"So where do we go from here?" she asked as she looked up into his smiling face.

"Aw Fluff are you asking me back to your place?" he snickered. She gave him an ineffectual punch and then a hug. "I know, save the city first and then more snuggles."

Below them the chaos continued, but it was more like mass confusion as many of the militia and even some of the cops were abandoning their posts. To the east, they could see that the fires were beginning to be contained or had finally burned themselves out.

* * *

"So without Bellwether's leadership, her allies have fled and their scheme has begun to collapse," Agent Jack Savage reported to the large lion in the blue pinstripe suit. "We have masses of angry citizens taking to the street in protest and the remnants of the corrupt police and hardcore militia are beginning to lose control of the city. Officer Fangmeyer has led a group to recapture the wall's weather controls and they have turned back on the turbines to cool down Tundratown, while Mister Big's rebels have recaptured most of that part of the city."

"Good, I will have to meet this mysterious Mister Big," Mayor Lionheart laughed. "I guess the city will have to come to an understanding with him and his bears." The lion had been released from jail earlier by Higgins and his loyal cops.

"At the stadium, the predators who were being detained there were led by a charismatic maned wolf by the name of Willie Vermelho and they quickly overwhelmed the few remaining guards," Judy added. "They've started calling him Will Scarlett, like one of Robin Hood's Merry Mammals was named."

"That's fitting," the lion chuckled. "Downtown is under the control of Chief Bogo and his cops again?"

"Yes sir," Savage nodded. "Our medical team is still working on an antidote for Ramsey's drug, but so far they haven't succeeded. We've rescued the infected citizens who were detained at the asylum, but they are still savage and are being held in the clinic. They were left unattended at the asylum and are malnourished."

Judy noticed that one of the handsome hare's paws clenched tightly into a fist and she remembered the beautiful snow white arctic vixen who was in the cage. Perhaps there was more in their relationship then just fellow agents?

"That's terrible!" Lionheart sighed. "How could anyone hate a fellow mammal like that? I'll go and see them after we finish this meeting. What about Ramsey, have we found him yet?"

"He's probably with one of the many pockets of militia fanatics and rogue cops that are still holding out," Judy replied. "Nick will find him!"

"This friend of yours with the super suit, can he be trusted?" the mayor asked. "So much power, it has to be tempting to just take control by force. He must know that we can't stop him if he tries."

"Sometimes you've just have to hope for the best," the tall thin hare sighed.

Nick was looking for Ramsey as he flew from one firefight to another and sometimes the very presence of the fox caused the fanatics to surrender, but most of the time he had to fight them and he made quick work of their resistance. As he zoomed across the morning sky, he could see mammals below looking up and pointing and although some did so in fear, most cheered as he flew by.

* * *

He came to the downtown police station to turn himself in to Bogo and now the dejected camel named Salazar sat in the chair and looked over at the thin grey and black striped hare in the black suit. "We should have won," the former councilmammal sighed as he took off his red fez. "Our plan was almost flawless, but who knew that a super powered fox would appear from out of nowhere? Sure, we expected Mister Big to rebel, but not Bogo and Higgins."

"It's over with, so tell me where is Ramsey?" Savage snapped.

"Ah, I would love to negotiate a deal for my cooperation but we don't have time for that do we?" the camel replied as he shook his hump. "The ram has gone crazy and he intends to infect the whole city with his toxin. He thinks he can rule over a city gone savage."

"How?" Lionheart asked. The large lion glared at the ungulate with anger.

"He has made his toxin into a fine powder and is going to launch a missile over the city which will explode and release it like a blue mist overhead. It will infect anyone it touches," camel sighed. "He's hiding in the old observatory on top of Gotham Point."

* * *

 **Next week: Holy Bovine, Fox! It's the Battle for Gotham Point.**


	16. END GAME

**Chapter 16: END GAME**

* * *

 **Happy Friday! We are getting to the end of our story, only two chapters left…aww! But don't worry, next week I'll introduce you to the next story in the** ** _I Love the 80's Flashback Fridays Series_** **.**

 **I could have been really mean and not finished the story, just like the last five episodes of** ** _The Greatest American Hero_** **were never aired. The final episode was to have been** **"The Greatest American Heroine" in which Ralph had to find a replacement because his identity had been compromised. Which brings up the question that if that was so important, why didn't they give him a mask or at least a pair of glasses like Clark Kent wore? Perhaps this was a precursor to the new series which will feature a female in the heroic role.**

 **Speaking of unfinished, I'm still working on solving that darn Rubik's Cube! So while I'm working on that, enjoy tonight's exciting chapter.**

* * *

Judy squeezed into her armored vest and checked the many pouches that hung on her body for their contents of pepper sprays, CS grenades, throwing tranquilizer darts and two large boomerangs. Then she strapped her pistol onto her thigh and pulled on a pair of fingerless black nylon fighting gloves. She was still wearing Nick's black cape around her shoulders and Jake Runnel came over and helped her adjust her gear. The raccoon had become a valuable assistant to Doctor Honeybadger in the manufacture of the team's special weapons.

Across the room, Fangmeyer snapped his metal whip into the air and it crackled to life with electricity. Like most of his team, he wore a mixture of standard police equipment and special armor developed for them by the doctor. Behind the big tiger she saw other familiar officers suiting up, Bob Johnson was there and the big lion was combing his mane. McHorn looked like a robot with all his armor plating and the rhino carried a huge multiple barreled grenade launcher. Next to him, Officer Jackson was helping Andersen with his gear and the tiger was carefully adjusted the polar bear's taser gauntlets.

"So there is only a single road that leads up to Gotham Point and we're going to have to fight our way up there tooth and claw," Fangmeyer growled. "We have to move fast, reports indicate that Ramsey has weaponized his formula into a powder."

"There's more than one way up there," Agent Savage added. "While one team is knocking on their front door, another team is going to go through the backdoor."

"How?" Jackson asked. "There is a cliff on the backside of the observatory. It would be impossible for us to scale that cliff in time and if we try to use a blimp, they'll see us coming."

"We have a very strong fox that flies," Savage reminded them. "He is going to carry a small team up there and drop them off right in Ramsey's lap."

* * *

They looked upwards as the costumed fox soared towards them. "Ten bucks that he does a superhero landing like in the movies," the rhino grunted to the tiger. With a grin, he watched as the fox dropped for a fast landing with his paw down. But mere inches from the ground, Nick hovered.

"Super hearing," he explained to the disappointed rhino.

"You owe me!" Fangmeyer laughed as he held his paw towards his larger companion.

"You think I can reach my wallet under all this armor?" McHorn angrily snapped back at the tiger and then looking at Nick, he added. "This runt is too skinny to pick us up, I'm heavier than I look."

The tiger stepped back from the rhino as Nick approached and with one paw, effortlessly picked up the armored officer and held him over his head.

"Okay, I was wrong!" McHorn bellowed. "Put me down!"

With a thunk, Nick dropped the much larger mammal onto the ground. "So tell me again, why I just don't just go in there myself?" he asked Fangmeyer.

"Despite his looks, Officer McHorn is a demolitions expert and I'm going along to keep any eye on you, because Savage told me to," the tiger replied.

The old Gotham Observatory had been built over one hundred years ago and was a large ornate grey stone building perched on a mountainous outcropping overlooking the Rainforest District. It was once a state of the art facility that housed one of the largest telescopes ever built, but time had caught up with it and as the city expanded, so did its light pollution which interfered with the delicate instrument's performance. Although now empty of its scientific equipment, the building's location made it a very popular tourist site where one could stand and look over most of the city and it was reconfigured into a space museum and planetarium. Nick could remember going there in elementary school and watching what the teacher's loved to call the celestial theater in the round.

It was several hours later before the column of armored police vehicles and the SWAT teams came to a halt before the gates that surrounded the old stone building. While the column wound its way up the road, more than a few of the vehicles had been damaged by the intense gunfire they were taking, but so far no officers had been severally hurt or killed. "We're receiving heavy fire down here!" Savage called into his radio. "I think we have their attention, Alpha team its time!"

"10-4," Fangmeyer called back as he looked over at the much smaller costumed fox. "Wilde, are you sure you can carry the two of us?"

The fox scratched his muzzle as he looked over at heavly armored tiger and rhino with a grin. "Sure, this should be a piece of cake!" he chuckled. "But if I have to drop one of you, which one should it be? I understand you cats always land on your paws."

"Not funny fox!" the rhino grumbled as he adjusted the large rifle that was over his shoulder and patted the large pistol on his hip. "Come on, let's get this done. I'm itching in this tin can."

The fox took three steps and then after briefly soaring into the sky, came back and hovered as the tiger and rhino handed him the ends of the nylon straps that were attached to their battle gear. Without even a grunt, he took off into the air with them hanging under him. McHorn marveled as they flew through the sky and he looked down at the city below them, things were slowly beginning to return to normal but the blackened scars were still quite evident. "They'll see us coming!" the officer grunted.

"Nope, because this is where it gets fun!" the fox laughed as he began to ascend towards the ground. They leveled out just above the tree line. More than a few mammals who were outside stared in disbelief as they saw the three of them zip overhead. The fox bobbed up and down, just missing the taller trees and waited to the last minute to shift to soar past a tall church steeple.

"Are you trying to give me a heart attack?" the rhino grunted.

"With your hard head, you'd got right through it," Nick replied with a laugh.

They came closer to the backside of the mountain and the huge sheer cliff loomed before them. It almost looked like they were going to slam into the wall of grey rocks and the tiger saw the rhino's eyes widen. At the very last moment, Nick changed his trajectory and began to fly upwards hugging the cliff's side.

"Where are you Alpha team?" Savage's voice called out on the radio. "We're taking a beating down here!"

"Almost to target," Fangmeyer called back. "Beta Team, we need your distraction now!"

The gunfire increased and Nick scowled. "Sounds like they're in trouble!" he said to the two officers. "Let's get this over with!"

They landed on the walkway just outside of the huge round equatorial room where the large telescope had once been mounted. The doors of the dome were open and something silver poked out of the opening. "Lock and load!" the rhino bellowed as he charged forward at the group of rebels on the other side of the platform with his grenade launcher blazing.

Nick heard the tiger's electric whip crackle to life as Fangmeyer rushed to joined the rhino in the fight. But the fox hesitated in joining them, although he knew that they were supposed to attack the enemy's flank. Looking up at the opening, his eyes widen when he realized what he saw…it was a missile! "Guys!" he called toward the two officers, but neither could hear him. His ears flattened as he heard a rumbling sound from inside and saw smoke. "Guys, he have a problem, I mean a really big problem!"

Pushing the door open, he walked into the large room and saw that the huge rocket had just begun to launch. He began to leap towards the missile, but hesitated when he heard the tiger cry out in pain. Turning, he ran back out on the walkway only to see that Officer Fangmeyer had been hit by a grenade and blown off the side of the building and the large tiger was plummeting towards the ground below.

"Get Stripes!" the rhino bellowed as he charged horn first into the group of rogue cops, scattering them around.

Nick looked up at the missile before he dove off the cliff and down towards the falling tiger. He flew as fast as he could and just mere inches from the ground, snatched the larger police officer by his armor and pulled him upwards. "That was too close!" Nick growled.

* * *

 **Next week is our story's conclusion and an answer to a question.**


	17. Heroes

**Chapter 17: Heroes**

* * *

 **Another Friday night and this is the final chapter in our story, _The Greatest Zootopian Hero_ and yes ****Dark Fox Tailz** **, tonight I will reveal Wolford's fate. However, the I Love the 80's Flashback Friday Series will soon continue with a brand new story that I hope you will enjoy!  
**

 **The television show** _ **The Greatest American Hero**_ **and movies such as the** _ **Superman**_ **series and Tim Burton's 1989** _ **Batman,**_ **starring the talented** **Michael Keaton** **,** **Jack Nicholson** **and** **Kim Basinger** **, laid the groundwork for the proliferation of today's superhero based television and movies such as _Avengers: Infinity War_. For more Zootopia superhero stories, check out some of the other stories on fanfiction. Writer MagicAlpha has a neat story called _Paws for Justice_ going and DrekkDeina has the wonderful story ****_Shards_. I also have three short crossover superhero stories called the _Neville's Wand Trilogy_ which brings Nick and Judy humorously stumbling into the realities of DC Comics, Marvel, and Harry Potter. **

****For something totally different, check out my latest series about Zootopia's favorite little surfer, Stone Kole. I have completed the first story, _Zootopia: Stone Kole in Hang Ten!_ and I am currently working on the sequel, _Zootopia: Stone Kole in Dark Paradise_ (It has zombies, voodoo, and a ghost!).  
****

 **So its time to put away the toys and grow up for a day or two as spring quickly moves into summer down here on the farm. I really need to go fiddle with my old John Deere 318 tractor and get it's blades nice and sharp before my wife makes me take an old hand scythe to the lawn. I keep trying to tell her the dandelions sure are pretty this year and the bees do need to eat too. I hope you enjoy this chapter and thank you for reading my story.**

* * *

The fox wheeled around and dove towards the falling Tiger, catching the larger mammal as if he was a kitten. "Wilde, don't be an idiot!" Fangmeyer growled. "You have to stop the missile, you should have let me fall!"

"No one else dies if I can help it," the fox snapped back as he landed and gently dropped the tiger on the ground. He looked up as he heard a roar from above and then seeing the missile, he took three steps before launching himself into the air and flew after it.

The missile soared high into the air and Nick pushed himself to fly as fast as he could to intercept it, but just before he reached it there was a massive explosion. "NO!" he yelled as he was thrown backwards. A cloud of blue colored powder filled the air in front of him.

Judy stared in horror at the sky and at the fox who seemed helpless, she knew that when the blue mist landed on the city it would turn everyone it touched feral and there was nothing she or anyone could do to stop it.

As Doug Ramsey pulled on his environmental suit, he looked up at the sky and at the fox who had stopped falling and was now hovering above the city. "Useless fool," the ram yelled at him. "With all your great strength, you can't stop it!"

Nick ignored the hornless ram's taunts as he watched the blue mist that was falling before him and concentrated, reaching out with the suit's force field and he felt it stretching. He was surprised as the field encompassed the deadly powder and compressed it into a ball, trapping it inside. The stress was was so great that it almost caused him to pass out, but he continued to concentrate. "Can't lose control…" he muttered to himself. "I can't let this get to Carrots and the others even if it kills me!" His eyes now glowed red and a beam of his heat vision shot down into the ball of pollen causing it to catch fire and burn. There was a massive flare up in front of him and the heat blew the flames back into his face.

Judy screamed as she watched the burning fox plummet out of the sky and winced as he slammed onto the ground. "No…no…no!" she yelled as she ran toward Nick's inert and very naked body, no remnants of the suit were anywhere to be seen. She picked up his head and held it in her lap and she ran her paws along his muzzle. "Please come back to me Nick!" she sobbed.

Jack glanced at the fallen fox and the rabbit crying over the body, then he looked up at the sky and saw that the blue powder had turned to ash and was falling like black snow. "Move, he yelled to Bogo and the team. "Round them up before they escape!"

Judy cradled Nick in her arms as she sniffled, "You big idiot you did it, you saved us all. You're a hero… you're my hero, but…"

She never finished as she saw his green eyes flutter open and look up at her. "I'm your hero?" he asked. Then he gave her a smirk before adding, "Really Fluff, what would your mother say about you cradling a naked fox in your lap?"

"Nick!" she cried out in joy. "You're alive!"

"That might be debatable," he groaned. "That hurt!"

"You ruined everything!" a voice yelled. Nick and Judy looked up to see Doug Ramsey was standing next them with a pistol in his hoof and his face was contorted in rage as he lowered the gun. "Die fox!"

"No!" Judy screamed as she tried to cover Nick with her body, she heard the pistol crack twice and whimpered. Before the ram could fire again, there was a zap and she looked up to see Ramsey staggering before falling backwards. Glancing behind her, she saw that Jack was standing not far away holding an oversized taser rifle.

"That's for Skye," the hare growled as he watched the ram writhing in pain.

A paw reached up and grabbed her shoulder. "Are you okay Judy," Nick asked with concern as he tried to sit up.

"He shot you twice Nick, how can you not be hurt?" she asked as she ran her paws though his fur, trying to find where the bullets had hit his body.

"Not that I don't really, really like the feel of your paws on me," the fox chuckled as he sat up. "But, I think I need to get dressed, so if you would mind not touching me for a moment." She scooted back as he concentrated and the suit seemed to ooze out of his fur and over his body.

"How did you do that?" she gasped at him as he stood and helped her stand. "I thought the suit was destroyed, it was gone when you hit the ground."

"If the suit was destroyed, wouldn't the cape have disappeared too?" he asked with a grin. "Ramsey didn't shoot me Judy because you were in the way. He shot you twice in the back, but the cape saved you from harm."

She looked down at the cape. "But the costume only works for you!" she stammered. "How did it disappear into you?"

"The suit and I have come to a mutual understanding," Nick replied. "We have achieved a symbiotic relationship, it is part of me and I'm part of it. Together we are one."

"But why did your cape protect me?" the rabbit asked as she removed the cape and fondled the material in her paws.

"The suit likes you and knows how much I care for you, so it created another of itself to bond to you. To keep you safe for me," Nick replied. "Now come on partner, we need to help round up the last of the bad guys and put an end to this."

Judy grinned as she turned and wrapped the cape back around her solders. Then drawing the two boomerangs she had tucked in her belt, she looked at him and then rolled her eyes as something black unfolded from out of his back and flapped in the wind.

"I've got to have a cape," he laughed. "Super Wolf has one in the comics, so Fantastic Fox has to have one too!"

"We need to work on a better name Slick!" she laughed as she charged toward the fighting. "Yeah, we definitely need to work on a better name."

They quickly joined Bogo's team in rounding up the bad cops.

The city slowly returned back to normal, although there was still much lingering tension between some of the predators and prey, but in general there was a new sense of peace between the species. Rebuilding of both of the damaged city and its psyche began under the charismatic leadership of Mayor Lionheart and the new city council. Chief Bogo began to reorganize the police department and now fully embraced the Mammal Inclusion Initiative, which included a former raccoon thief by the name of Jake Runnel. Across town, Jack Savage took over as the Director of the ZBI with its new Special Crime Unit led by Captain Fangmeyer, the dashing hare worked with his beautiful wife, a snow white vixen named Skye.

* * *

Nick nuzzled the rabbit sitting in his lap, she was wearing a black dress and looked radiant as they both watched the sun setting into the mountains to the west. "Fluff, I feel like I'm on Cloud Nine tonight," he whispered into her ear.

"No Slick, I think this is a cumulus cloud!" she laughed as she stroked his tail, which was wrapped over her waist. "Maybe cloud eight, but not nine." They both looked down at the city below as its lights began to come to life in the growing darkness.

Suddenly his phone rang and he sighed as he answered it, "This better be good Savage…Pennington's back with another armored suit…miniguns and missiles… a gang of armored rhinos…only six?...yeah, we've got this."

"We better get going," he told the rabbit. "Fangmeyer's team needs our help."

"No, I can get this one myself because you promised to be somewhere else tonight," she shook her head.

"Are you sure you can handle it?" he asked her. She just smiled and kissed him before she rolled off his lap and began plummeting towards the ground far below. He watched as she twisted into a dive and as her dress began to expand into a large black hooded cloak that covered her body. Then as if it was alive, which it was, it spread out and formed wings as she now glided downwards towards the trouble.

"Duty calls!" he laughed to himself as flew in the other direction, towards his special destination where he landed and knocked on an apartment door. "Happy birthday Timmy! I promised to be here for my favorite fan's party," he proclaimed as the door opened and a smiling beaver cub looked up. Behind him the roomful of children excitedly squealed and laughed at the sight of the super fox in the red costume. "So who wants to go flying?" he asked.

* * *

"...and that my dear that is how Nick Wilde and his wife Judy became The Greatest Zootopian Heroes," the timber wolf in the shiny red jacket and black pants said as he finished his story, before he tucked his daughter under the covers. He stroked the silver fur between her ears and then looked over at her litter mate, the little boy had already crawled under the sheets and was acting like he was asleep.

The wolf smiled as he walked towards the door, which swished open as he approached. "Daddy," the little girl called out. "Why on earth does the female take the male's last name when they marry, didn't you change your last name to mommy's?"

The wolf once known as Alan Wolford smiled as he answered, "Earth customs are different then our planet's. Now go to sleep sweetie."

As he stepped out of the room, the door swished closed behind him and he peeked through the window. Already the little wolf like changeling had crawled out of his bed and was sneaking towards the window. Shaking his head, Alan opened the door again and tried not to laugh as his son froze with both of his legs and two of his four arms already out of the opening. "Get back in your bed now!" he mock growled. "This is my last warning Will Robinson!"

* * *

 **Coming up in the next I Love the 80's Flashback Fridays Series:** ** _Cherry Zoo: A Love Story of Sorts._ **

**The year is 2022 and personal relationships between male & females have gotten overly complicated. A former street hustler named Nick Wilde's fembot Cherry is on the fritz and he needs the parts to repair her, but his problem is that she's now a classic and they don't make what he needs anymore. This story is a parody of the 1987 cult film, **_**Cherry 2000**_ **.**

"Crap Wilde!" the fennec fox grunted as he looked into the insides of the machine. "You fried it really good!"

"She's not an…it!" the larger fox grumbled as he lovingly ran his paw along the robotic vixen's fake furry cheek. "Her name is Cherry and can you fix her?"

"Nope, ACME stopped making this model years ago and there aren't any parts to be found since the earthquakes cut off the warehouses," Finn answered. "You do know they got newer models that you can buy? They make them to last for a few years and then you dump the old model and get a new one. No one fixes anything anymore, it's called planned obsolescence."

"Use and abuse," Nick sighed as he sat down on the ancient van's tailgate. "I figured if you can keep this old clunker on the streets, you might be able to fix her."

"Sure, with the right parts," the small fox replied as he reached around and pulled a couple of brews out of a cooler. He stuck a straw into the top of the sack and sucked a mouth full of the liquid. "I miss the feel of an old aluminum can, why don't the make beer in cans anymore? Also who thought drinking anything from a sack was a bright idea?"

"I'm thirty two years old this year and I already miss the old days," the large fox said with a shrug. "Thirty two and I haven't been on a date with a real female in years, remember when I asked that vixen out at the bistro and she said I was sexually harassing her just by talking to her? How did we ever get to the point when lawyers are needed to negotiate a date?"

"It started with the #MeToo crowd and went out of control after that," Finn chuckled. "Good intentions gone badly and now everyone is overly afraid of offending each other nowadays, I can understand why you got a Cherry."

"She was my safe space," Nick sighed. "She was always there when I needed her. Cherry never questioned me, never argued, and always wanted to please me."

"You know there's a rumor that ACME dumped some of their old stuff out west of the city," the fennec fox said. "Beyond the Meadowlands, were no one who's sane goes unless they're running from the law or something."


End file.
